Enneadic Decennium: The Urban Game
by JuneoftheMearkat
Summary: AU. "There are ninety people in the Urban Game. Only nine, one of each number, can escape. You have 10 days. Do not disappoint me." -Zero
1. Chapter 1

**Meta-summary info:** This is NOT a novelization of the original _9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors_ game. All the characters and many key plot points and concepts have been carried over, but have been either modified or omitted in lieu of the new story. This is classified as AU and is rated M for language, sexual humor/situations, and blood/gore.

**Disclaimer:** I did not create, and have no ownership of, the awesome game _9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors_. All characters and ideas are the property of Aksys Games.

**Warning :P -** Chapter 1 is very slow moving and is essentially one inner monologue from Junpei. Subsequent chapters will generally move faster in pace, but chapter 1 is a necessary establishing point for the story. WALL OF TEXT.

Also, for extra atmosphere, play "Quietus" from the 999 soundtrack near the end of the chapter ^_~.

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When diluted and purified down to the barest of concepts, teenagers can be divided into one of two different groups. The first group holds an opinion tinted by nostalgia; they view high school as a permanently locked safe of memories and abstain from opening that safe for fear of those memories escaping. The second group is a little more complicated; they aren't sure whether high school is four years of pointless trials designed to test their patience or a necessary education. To these individuals, college is when their lives will truly begin. Crushed and preserved like consolidated essence, both these opinions harbor credibility. That is, until whatever opinion has chosen to defend is tossed a nine-faced Rubik's cube worth of contradictions.

Junpei had always been positive that was a follower of the latter camp, but being faced with two ten-page research papers on the literary significance of W. B. Yeats and the (completely unrelated) subjective boundaries that define a protagonist, he was beginning to question the sanity of his choice.

Nestled comfortably into one of the firm, cushioned chairs stationed throughout the lounge, Junpei reached for the scattered pages of notes and references laid out before him. Flashes of heat trickled through his forehead from the abrupt movement and Junpei could feel every one of his vertebrae snap into place as he feebly grabbed at the textbook. Clapping the book closed with a light twist of his wrist, Junpei immediately exhaled a long sigh of relief and decided to call it a day.

If Junpei had to contemplate even one more verse of cryptic poetry he probably would have smashed his head through the flat screen TV. Being an adult pushed Junpei to become more independent and complete as a person; however, it was times like these where days of tending to rabbit cages and getting into pointless brawls with bullies shined much brighter than long, crusty months of studying. Junpei supposed it was his own fault in the first place for putting effort into being a studious undergraduate. The benignly clever boy desired only one future at the moment: to be a celebrated author. Unfortunately, it was a major that required-what a shock-its assignments to be lengthy, well planned, and up to critical expectations. Junpei was already strict enough as his own critic; being trapped under the tutelage of critics with nine times his experience was like hanging a medieval axe over the cowlicks on his head. Speaking of cowlicks, Junpei slicked a large hand through his hair and deduced that a shower was first in order when he got home.

Wordlessly, Junpei gathered his things and stuffed them into his backpack. Flicking his neck to clear away greasy hair, the brunette trotted to the lounge exit. Junpei tugged open the glass door, about to leave, before he caught the sound of shifting sneakers behind him.

"Hey Junpei!" a male voice called.

Junpei paused, his mind halfway to the clouds, and looked over his right shoulder. "Oh, hey. What's going on?"

The fellow classmate who had been so kind as to yank Junpei out of his reverie was a junior by the name of Tenma. Fairly familiar with the acquaintance's square-rimmed glasses and unremarkable height, Junpei couldn't exactly consider Tenma a friend, but they certainly got along well enough.

Followed by two seniors Junpei couldn't be damned to recall the names of, Tenma waved in a friendly manner.

"There's a huge party going on at Mika's apartment tonight. We thought, you know, it would be cool if you could go." A tad unnerved by Junpei's lack of a reaction, Tenma forced out an awkward laugh. Junpei didn't think there was anything funny about what he said.

"Some girls from southern university will be there, and from what I heard, Mika's got surround sound plus a full keg of Heineken to entertain us," Tenma said, before lowering his voice and leaning in.

"Be a tango for two in wonderland, if you catch my drift?" Turning a whisper of a grin on his last word, Junpei could see the short boy's glasses slide down the ridge of his nose.

Fiddling with his vest, Junpei did nothing more than raise an eyebrow.

"No thanks dude, I'm already feeling tired enough as it is. I'll probably crash the moment I get home," Junpei stated in firm indifference. Uninterested in any hijinks that would ensue at such a gathering, Junpei slouched into the wall for extra emphasis.

A flicker of disappointment crossed Tenma's face in he shrugged. "Suit yourself," he replied. "Sleep. Partying. It's all good in the long run." Tenma offered Junpei one last polite smile and the group disappeared out the door.

The board of Junpei's thoughts erased itself until it was a pure, blank slate. Attempting the keep himself from nodding off, Junpei walked to his car.

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A navy blue Chevrolet pulled in front of a downtown complex, the engine calming to a low mumble that dissipated into the night sky. Patiently waiting streetlights dotted the edge of the parking lot, bathing the solitary car in a gentle glow. The apartment building loomed overhead at an impressive nine stories, standing beside a congregation of hardwood trees. Tonight was a pleasant wash of shadows with no underlying motives; it was a night that hid no mystery, no suspicion that something prowled behind an empty stairwell. Whoever decided the well-being and fate of the world was in a benevolent mood.

Rumble.

Grumble.

Whiiiiiiiiiine.

Whiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine.

Junpei winced and glared unappreciatively at his stomach as he shifted the car into park. The tanned brunette couldn't understand why his body craved food when he felt like he would just deliver it into the 'porcelain throne' a few minutes later. Pulling the key out of the ignition, Junpei decided he wasn't up to lugging his backpack inside and made to step out of the car.

Immediately, a migraine assaulted Junpei's skull and he fumbled to grab the steering wheel to prevent his face from kissing the pavement. Senses elevated to uncomfortable levels, blood pounded through the college student's eardrums in a steady rhythm that screamed "You're sick dumbass!" Junpei managed to drag himself to the lobby, cursing his bad luck the whole way.

"Well, at least I know why I've been so miserable all day," he mused.

Reaching the entrace hall, Junpei noted that nobody seemed to be around. Empty couches watched a blockbuster horror movie on the TV hanging over the coffee table. Mildly creeped out, Junpei averted his eyes.

No university students, huh? Understandable, considering it was about nine o'clock Monday, a rather detrimental time to be out if you had classes to wake up for. He grimaced again in response to the flaming pains in his chest and hastened his march to the elevator.

On the ride up, the college student listened into the grating elevator music in an effort to ignore the lurching noises coming from his belly. Elevator music was... odd, though not exactly in a good way. It certainly had that addictive element of catchiness to it that Junpei couldn't resist, but it was also cheesy and irritating to listen to. Junpei was more into ska and alternative rock, as were most people, so why weren't elevators graced with such basic attitudes in musical taste? Honestly, elevators needed to get out more.

Junpei traced his fingers over the numbered buttons, looking up at the ding of the door sliding open. A red five insistently blinked overhead as Junpei edged into the hall. By now, molotov cocktails were being tossed back and forth inside Junpei's chest, prompting him to pick up his pace down the corridor.

Before he could even comprehend any signs of life in the hallway, Junpei reached the door to his apartment. He unlocked it and trundled inside, holding his head tight with one hand and turning on the light with the other.

Cold perspiration clung to his fingers in a steady stream. Breathing deep pants through his mouth, Junpei loped from the entranceway to the kitchen and pulled open the refrigerator. An instant breeze of relief wafted out of the appliance, caressing the heat radiating off of Junpei. The college student scanned the inner confines before grabbing the beverage that his inner organs—and psyche—desired so desperately.

Plopping the carton of milk next to the stove, Junpei rummaged through the cabinet below.

"A-hah! There you are, Mr. Cooking Pot. Must have been pretty stuffy down there all day with only Senior Toaster for company," Junpei said cheerfully, sliding the old pot onto the burner. Popping open the top of the carton, he poured a fifth of the milk into the pot and turned the knob for the lower left burner. Flames burst out and engulfed the reliable tool of steel.

Humming the tune to "Battlecry", the weary young adult pulled a chair from the kitchen table. A rattling screech joined the sound of Junpei's sizzling abdomen; his arms shivering from the nearly unbearable noise, Junpei fell backwards onto the chair and slouched, elbows folded on the table.

He rested his chin on his knuckles. "Tch..." Curling his fingers into his cheeks, the brunette stared at the steaming pot atop the stove.

How old was he? Four? Warm cups of milk were for kids snacking on teddy grams after riding their tricycle a couple laps around the driveway. Junpei had no explanation for his actions; on instinct, the twenty-one year old man had simply gravitated towards the lonely container of milk. The dairy product was a last resort many years ago, nothing but calming agent to lull little Junpei to sleep. A drawn-out yawn pried itself out of Junpei's mouth and laid his ear against the table. His eyelids flittered, but Junpei mentally commanded them to stay open.

Perhaps he was being driven by memories. Memories. It was an innocent word to the average ear, but to Junpei, memories were what drove him to move on, to be... _Junpei_. Not that that made any basic sense. Junpei was himself, he never pretended differently, so why didn't the aspiring author have anybody to _be himself _with?

Tapping his fingernails on the tablecloth, Junpei thought back to what Tenma had said to him earlier. Why hadn't Junpei accepted his invitation? The brunette snorted through his teeth, knowing already that one question answered the previous.

When Tenma had mentioned those girls, Junpei's muscles had seized up, his heart pumping into overdrive. Not a good overdrive; it had been a warning. A warning that it would be wrong to accept.

Wrong, just wrong. Wrong without remorse. Wrong as in morally, spiritually, mentally, and physically. Wrong beyond epic fail. Wronger than... well, you get the idea.

Junpei was a fucking pussy.

What was so bad about hanging out and enjoying himself with other people? What the hell! Junpei had the right to just go to the party and leave anytime he wanted. Booze, babes, and everything in-between were options on the menu—pick one or order the vegetarian dish. Was that so hard?

Apparently for Junpei, it was.

Junpei got up to check on the stove. Tiny bubbles were gurgling over the surface of the milk. Reaching for the pot handle, the brunette turned off the stove and swirled the white liquid for a few seconds. His pupils watched the rippling swing of the milk, admiring how gently it raced around the rim. Round and round, like a clock accelerating into the future.

Dumping the milk into a mug with a plaid "O" painted across the front, Junpei returned to his seat. Allowing the steam to sift through his nostrils before lifting the cup to brush his lips, Junpei took a tentative sip.

Essence of contentment saturated the blood of Junpei's veins, imitating the wonders of clarity inducing oxygen. Junpei tilted his head backwards to gaze up at the ceiling. He could feel the banging in his skull fade away—almost akin to radio static dissolving and revealing the clear volume of the song underneath.

Junpei was over generalizing. It wasn't exactly that he had no friends. Specifically, he had no best friends. Inside jokes, secret handshakes, virginity promises, and all that bullshit what have you. Junpei had none of it. At least, he didn't now. His mind cleansed and able to creak to life after hours of agonizing sickness, Junpei had a pretty good idea of the reason why.

The college student's heart was too soft. The world was a cruel place; people frequently disappointed Junpei on a regular basis, whether he consciously made those judgments or naturally associated them. Junpei couldn't help it—when he overheard negative whispers being passed between classmates or saw gangs of douche-faced guys swearing every other syllable about some slut they fucked at her condo, his chest would tighten and constrict into a ball of tense, relentless discouragement. Anger would well up in rolling waves; a distaste that made Junpei's brow furrow into hard bumps and caused him to scowl at the nearest bystander. He would hate those people, rationalize his accusations, then hate them even more. But, greatest of all, Junpei would hate himself for being so weak. People like that weren't necessarily bad or ill natured, and Junpei was certainly far from perfect. The twenty-one year old admitted he was a bit on an idealist. However, that didn't stop Junpei from wishing he could trust them not to thrust his heart to the ground and crush it underfoot.

Junpei gulped back his last drop of milk and left the mug on the table, ready to get to bed. Pushing in his chair, the brunette paced to the bathroom. Too tired to shower or even change into his pajamas, Junpei decided he would just dunk his head in the sink and sleep in his clothes. They were already slightly rank from the sweat pouring out of him earlier, so no issues there.

Junpei's bathroom was small but charming. The walls were painted a navy blue to match the black and white checker pattern of the floor tiles. Of course, to combine his two favorite colors, Junpei coordinated the interior with sunrise red towels and a maroon shower curtain. To the left was the counter, the sink indented into the smooth surface. Behind was the toilet and combination bath and shower, a fuzzy blue carpet resting at the foot of the tub. Junpei turned and adjusted the faucets to a suitable temperature. While waiting for the sink to fill with water, he opened the shower curtain and snatched up a bottle of shampoo.

With no hesitation, the exhausted boy buried his head under the glassy surface of the water and scrubbed a dollop of shampoo through his hair. Making sure all of the foam melded into the sink before reemerging, Junpei unblocked the drain and proceeded to towel off.

The junior author's own reflection blinked thickly back at him in the mirror above the sink. Kneading the towel over his scalp, Junpei studied the deep indentations etched into his cheeks. It stuck him as strange, considering he was feeling much better than before. Junpei chalked it up to stress. Ponder any more that night and his frontal cortex might unravel into mush.

Despite that, Junpei felt a personal memoir from times long gone creep into his system at the vision of his own reflection. Junpei may be, just a smidgen, something of an idealist, but there was one person he used to be close to that had an even greater noble heart than his own.

Akane Kurashiki.

The girl of his twelve-year-old dreams.

A smirk twitching at the edge of his lip, Junpei looked fixedly at the mirror, straight past the mundane image of his own face. Recollections of Akane spilled into his center of focus. Gradually, Junpei drew a picture from his memory, starting with those big blue eyes. Curving inward to the middle of her face, a thin, button nose took shape. Like a rocking boat, Junpei paused to trace an upward crescent moon to mark the placement of her lips. Dusted pink and perked in an adorable smile, Junpei finished his work of art with her wavy tumble of dark hazelnut locks.

She was surely the sweetest thing Junpei had ever seen, but a tinge of sadness burnt Junpei in that he only knew what she looked like as a girl in elementary school. A hopeful idea came to him—though he was fully aware it wouldn't happen anytime soon—Junpei had a fleeting urge to see her again, all grown up. His friend.

His real friend.

Shaggy hair dry enough to be comfortably laid on a pillow, Junpei exited the bathroom, shutting the wooden door behind him. Moving next to the bed stand, Junpei picked up his digital alarm clock. Blearily flashing 10:09 at him, Junpei was about to set the alarm when he caught sight of something in the glare reflecting off the glass.

It was a figure in a gas mask and cloak.

". . ."

". . ."

Junpei's eyes split open wide enough to see crimson rivers of veins lining the outer lid. Heaving in a strangled cross of a gasp and a wail, Junpei realized too late his grave mistake. Sickening, white mist overflowed his lungs, colored splotches screening themselves over his line of vision.

The clock slid from his fingertips and cluttered to the ground, Junpei's body following soon after. With his last, dwindling reserve of willpower, he drew his eyes up to confirm the face of his captor.

And then, there was a void.

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Read and review! Construction criticism is considered and greatly appreciated!

~KlipsyKat


	2. Chapter 2

**To Reviewers:**

**Peach The Hedgehog:** Thanks for the detailed feedback! I liked your comment about the narrative being long-winded, because its so true :P. I edited the chapter and re-posted it afterwards after you mentioned that, because writing is a process, not an event (thank you, creative writing class ^_^)! Also, to clarify, and maybe give a bit away _, there are 90 people in the game, but it will almost always focus around the characters of 999. It's mostly peripheral, if you may. The other 81 people _will_ be important at certain points. Just… not as much.

**mexican wine:** Awww, such a nice compliment ^_^. Grammar is important (especially when FF net likes to screw with my line breaks).

Thank you again! And yes, Junpei is dorkilicious enough to talk to cooking pots. He's quite the king of inappropriate jokes XD.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors_. It belongs to Aksys Games and the vault of epicness.

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_Blood. Spurting into a grotesque fountain above Junpei's face. He was laid out on the ground, motionless, spread like a five-pronged star. The sky was a black ceiling; all Junpei could see was the light of the moon hovering in place. _

_Was this Hell? He never believed in the concept of faith. Faith gave him nothing. The whole reason Junpei lied there was because of faith. More powerful than hydrochloric acid, faith brainwashes people. Junpei had been brainwashed, and now he was paying the consequences. _

_ He felt nothing. Sliced deep into his neck was a silver knife. That knife was a God, a savior. Junpei could marry that knife, whisper sweet nothings into the handle as they danced the night away. That is, if he had any limbs to dance with._

_ Broken and twisted haphazardly every which way, Junpei's disembodied head closed its eyes._

_ Finally, he could sleep._

Junpei vaulted out of bed. Croaking out dry air in rapid wheezes, the college student rolled over and instantly met with the cracked overlay of a hardwood floor.

"Oh-Shit!... owwwwww." He doubled over and clutched his forearm. "Funnybonefunnybone, ow." Groveling on the floor, Junpei ground his teeth painfully.

The college student shifted his legs to gain better balance. Every movement produced an exaggerated groan from the floorboards. The vibrations in his arm finally died down. He planted both palms on the ground and twisted his neck to examine the room.

First and foremost, Junpei was not in his own bedroom. That much he could conclude from the ratty, graying condition of the bed he just tumbled from. That thing was seriously filthy; Junpei crumpled his lip at the knowledge that he had spent the night on such a poor excuse for a bed. Steadily rising to his feet, the brunette flexed his fingers, peering at the rest of this strange, abandoned room.

Looming in their close presence, the walls of the mysterious room were narrowly juxtaposed. The ceiling was only about seven feet tall, but appeared even lower, giving Junpei the urge bend over backwards. Furnishings were sparse; other than the bed, there was a lamp that struggled to give off the feeble light it was producing and a TV that was old enough to be a grandfather. Junpei swept his left hand over the nightstand and examined the prominent layers of dust that congregated on the pads of his fingers. Rubbing them together with a pensive look, Junpei's attention abruptly swung to something on his wrist that wasn't supposed to be there.

Clamped securely around the joint of the brunette's wrist was a bright red bracelet. Brown eyes popped open and narrowed further into piercing slits.

"What's this?" Junpei asked himself, flipping the foreign object repeatedly. An eyeful of a single digit number flashed Junpei's interest. He angled his hand to his nose to see it better.

"Five..."

The number tasted sour on Junpei's tongue and a growing fury built up in the college student's throat. Junpei threw his arm down violently and cried out in anguish.

"WHERE THE HELL AM I!"

Like an answer bestowed by a pitying deity, the woes of Junpei's turmoil were shoved aside to make room for images of the evening before. Horrific representations of Junpei's capture returned to him in a waterfall of unanswered truths. The first time somehow paled in comparison to the second onslaught; Junpei slammed his hands onto his head to shield his mind from the flood of questions. Who was the figure in the gas mask? Where did he take Junpei? What the fuck was this watch that told him nothing but a goddamn number? And most importantly, how was he going to escape and get back home?

"Okay, gotta calm down" Junpei said with determination. "One step at a time. There's nobody here with me... at least, I don't think so, so there's no need to panic." Reeling on the precipice of his sanity, Junpei tried to regain logic to the situation. Curling his heels, Junpei started orbiting the room, searching intently for the exit.

It wasn't long before Junpei found the door. Innocuously pretending it hadn't been there the whole time, the hinged gateway was situated beyond the left fork facing the television. However, as Junpei expected, the knob was jammed tight; bolted beside it was a card key operated lock. If Junpei was to leave, he needed to obtain this special card.

Junpei returned to the dilapidated priso-er, _bedroom_, as much as he would rather stare dumbly at a useless door than have to endure the lovely aroma of peeling wallpaper. Batting away teasing dust particles from his nose, the college student set to work on finding that key.

He ducked under the bed. "Hmmm, what do we have here? A few mothballs, some gum, dead rats, aaaaannnnd... a sneaker. Great. That _really_ helps." Junpei rumbled out a growl and rolled his eyes.

Not throwing in the towel just yet, Junpei proceeded to the bed stand. Apparently, an inability to give up merited reward, because the next exploration proved much more fruitful.

Junpei tugged the single drawer below the lamp. Inside—stacked precisely and strapped tight with a silver cord—were two sets of key cards. The first set bore a black "1" on a red background. The other deck was the same size as the first, but instead displayed a "8" upon a blue backdrop. Junpei scooped up the cards and hooked his thumb though the elastic cords to slide them off.

He sheathed his discoveries like a hand of poker suits. "1, 2, and 3 on the red ones, and the blue ones have a 6, 7, and an 8." The cards were obviously his ticket out of this room, but Junpei had a feeling that just sliding them through the door lock randomly wasn't going to yield any results.

He mulled over and repeated the numbers, reciting them in all possible combinations. Rearranging them absentmindedly in his hand, Junpei racked his memory for the traditional symbolic meaning of each number, but produced only failed conclusion after failed conclusion. Leaking a deadpanned sigh, the brunette began fanning his face with the alternating pattern of azure and red.

"Doctor, doctor, I have an urgent matter to discuss with you!"

Junpei scrunched his features into a decrepit and scholarly visage.

"Great scott, mah boi! What is it?"

"These black, s-squiggly lines! They're so painful to look at, I don't understand!"

"What do you mean, young whippersnapper? These are nothing but numbers on cards."

Junpei pleaded with his boyish brown eyes.

"But sir, my head aches in enormous shakes at but a glance of these hideous symbols. Please tell me this disease that inflicts me so!"

Stroking his chin ponderously, Jupei regarded the bed in ominous seriousness.

"... well, alright. I must warn you though; there is no cure for this chronic condition."

Junpei flung his head to the right and halted with a desperate face.

"Oh please, tell me sir!"

"What you have, mah boi, is called only one thing:"

"…"

"Illiteracy."

Suspended in mid-pose, Junpei leaned frozen for a minute before a snicker snuck its way out of his mouth. Smirking helplessly to himself, he moved to tuck the key cards in his vest pocket.

Junpei's inappropriate gander at humor was cut short by the blip and arising crackle of a TV turning on. Cards halfway to their fate of eternal darkness, Junpei paused, sucked in his breath, then carefully turned towards the sound.

Pinpricks of pixels shuddered and gradually gained shape on the screen. Junpei watched, transfixed as the new face of his nightmares quivered to life. Nausea slithered its way through his intestines, and Junpei could do nothing but gape at the cloak bordered in shadow.

"I am Zero. Welcome to my city."

The unnaturally garbled timbre of the gas mask's voice screamed into Junpei's ears. However, he had no option but to listen.

And wait.

"You have been chosen to participate in the Urban Game. Inside of your bodies, I have planted a bomb; by now it will have passed through your digestive tract and into your small intestine, meaning you will not be able to remove it without injuring yourself significantly. It would be of your own poor judgment to try."

Junpei tenderly cupped his stomach.

"Scattered around this city are doors marked with the numbers one through nine. In order to enter these doors, players whose respective numbers add up to the digital root of that door must verify at the "RED" next to it. Now, how does one go about calculating a digital root? It is quite simple; add the digits of a group's collective numbers until you obtain a one or two digit number. If the number is two digits, add them together until only one digit remains. Remembering this concept is a crucial key to winning the Urban Game."

Junpei's mind briefly panned to the purpose of the key cards, but he forcefully snapped his awareness back to the television.

"This city will be a battlefield where only the strongest may prosper. The person you think you know the most may stab in the back, abandon you, or kill you if it will enhance their own chance of clawing up the ladder. I assure you, there is no other way to escape the city; you, as players, are barricaded in until you find the one manner of escape, or time is up. Permanently."

Bile leeched itself onto Junpei's esophagus, refusing to come out. Junpei swallowed it.

"Now, you must gather your resources as I bid you farewell. There are ninety people in the Urban Game. Only nine, one of each number, can escape. You have 10 days. Do not disappoint me."

The screen fizzled into a streak of color and blinked out.

All traces of humor blanched from Junpei's face. He had an infinite quota of questions shrieking to be answered, but first, he had to get out of this godforsaken cell.

Gripping the key cards securely in his fist, Junpei dashed to the exit door. Checking the bracelet on his left wrist, the college student knew exactly what to do.

Brandishing the cards that read "7", "1", and "6", Junpei slashed them through the card reader in quick succession. A congratulatory beep greeted him; ignoring it, he twisted the knob and shoved the door open.

Leaping into the dank hallway, Junpei accelerated past a never-ending parade of doors with one goal in mind.

He wanted out of this building, _now_.

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"There it is!"

Unsuspecting double-doors swung open and ejected the college student onto the sidewalk. Pumping his arms over his head like he was about to recite a cheer, Junpei bowed to the paved road.

"Sweet, fresh air! Halle-fucking-luyah!" Junpei proclaimed with a booming announcement to the sky.

Still for a moment, he wiped a hand over his chin sheepishly. Clearing his throat at the deserted neighborhood, Junpei straightened up to brush off his cargo shorts. With absolutely indication or clue of where to go, he began jogging in the direction of what appeared to be a phone booth down the sidewalk.

As he jogged along, the brunette mapped out his new surroundings.

Overwhelmed by the advantage of sheer size, Junpei was a tiny speck lost in a city of architecture. Zero hadn't been joking. Single file along the street were tons of buildings that seemed to stretch on forever. Tall buildings, houses, boarded up rent shacks, apartments, and kiosks... even a couple convenience stores and a post office. Zero's oversized lair was a big, frakking party for building diversity. However, the only thing Junpei could ask was-

"What is it all for?" he wondered out loud, plunking to a stop at the phone booth. Digging clumsily through his pockets, but turning up not one cent, Junpei huffed in frustration, yanking the phone off the hook and clamping it to his ear.

Silence. No dial tone or recording droned out. Junpei berated himself for being the tiniest bit surprised. Of course Zero wasn't going to give his pawns any way to communicate outside the city. Why did Junpei assume any different? Dejected, he set the phone back on the hook with a solemn "clunk".

Cracking one eye behind his hair, Junpei shook his head in disbelief at what he saw across the street. Standing there, sign rocking ever so slightly from the wind, was a café. Mind you, not one of those chain restaurant cafes that served coffee so strong it could be pumped like gasoline, rather, the kind of café that all the locals deemed their favorite meeting place.

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Junpei bent over and held his hands near his stomach. "That's right... it has to have been at least twelve hours since I've last eaten. Man, it would be nice have a toasted bagel with cream cheese right now..." Junpei wetted his lips hungrily.

His pupils slid back to the innocently expectant café, tempted. Junpei had nothing to lose at this point; the café was likely uninhabited if the lifeless state of Zero's city was anything to go by. Confident with his decision, Junpei ambled toward the restaurant.

Sign in full view, Junpei read off the title as he strolled in the door.

"Nonary café. Huh… strange name."

A bell jingled cheerfully as Junpei stepped through the door. Going up to the counter, Junpei called over the display case filled with pastries.

"Hello! Is anybody there? Can you hear me?"

The dark shadow seeping over the doorframe behind the counter confirmed what Junpei already knew. No matter how much tore his lungs out, pleading for someone to show up, he would remain on his own. Zero's city was enormous; whatever his kidnapper had said over that broadcast, something about eighty-nine other people or whatever, was useless to Junpei. If his gut feeling was correct, the rest of the people with Junpei had to be spread out a fair distance; it might take several hours before he met with any one of them.

Shrugging for the sake of giving up, Junpei maneuvered around the counter.

"Ooo, lookie here. I believe I spy an opening." Weaving his hand under the back cover of the display case, Junpei plucked a croissant from the front most basket. As much as he wanted a bagel, the power was shot in the entire café; toasting it was out of the question. However, much to his surprise, the croissant didn't feel stiff like it was stale.

"This food must have been put here recently" Junpei spoke with piqued curiosity. He gently crunched the pastry between his fingers, ripping off the corner and popping the delicate morsel in his mouth. Munching his supposed breakfast like a monkey in a cage, Junpei walked over to the rectangle of pitch black carved into the kitchenette wall.

Planting his feet solidly on the tile, the college student zoomed in on the column of black. "So dark … I'm gonna to need some kind of light to see what's back there." Junpei highly doubted he would find something as generous as a flashlight in the kitchen. First though, just to be safe, he poked his head through the room.

His shot at bravery gave him nothing but a headache from strained eyes. Junpei backed up to retrieve his head when the soft rustle of boxes permeated the darkness.

Junpei's caught his air mid-breath. What was that? His muscles moved automatically to switch on the light. Perfectly timed in unison, Junpei's face broadened with astonishment as the room lit up. How was that possible when the lights in front of the café refused to even cough up a spark? Luck seemed to award the university major when it felt like it today.

Cautiously tensing his shoulders, Junpei slowly entered the room. The gift of light revealed that the room was a storage closet for various types of food. Piled on a computer desk in the corner were mountains of papers; the rest of the closet was occupied by bulky, sealed boxes in metal shelves.

A muffled squeak escaped from behind a particularly tall array of cardboard containers. Homing in on the sudden noise, Junpei snatched the closest tool of defense he could see, which happened to be a cutting razor for opening packaging. Poised with the makeshift weapon at his side, Junpei strafed along the perimeter, one inch at a time, toward the gap separating the tower into two piles.

"I know you're there. You can't hide from me." Junpei pressed his lips into a hard line as he leaned one leg on the very tip of the open space. Brandishing the razor before his chest, Junpei could now clearly discern the hushed rattle of someone shivering.

Junpei inhaled, and sprung in front of the gap.

A terrified scream ricocheted off the walls of the storage closet. Junpei scrambled his arms around, knocking boxes over into a scattered avalanche around the room. He held the razor firmly back to his body, shaking.

And then, he looked.

"Uuah, ha, ugh … J-… Jumpy?"

Junpei gawked.

"Jumpy!"

Tearing his hand away, Junpei flung the box cutter into the shelves behind him. Another body launched itself into his chest and a combination of the extra weight and Junpei careening on the back of his heels caused them to plummet to the ground. The brunette yelled out a declaration of pain as his forearms flushed red from skinning them across the floor—he had just managed to catch his skull from banging against the iron rung of the shelf.

"Is… is that you?" The repeated sound of that sweet voice awoke Junpei from the fiery prickling of his skin.

Hanging no more than a few centimeters above his nose was the face of a girl. Her hair was wrapped in a small bun next to her cheek, with silky strands spilling out in threaded ripples through her black scarf. She dug her blue eyes deep into his mind. It was a gesture that oozed familiarity; Junpei knew right away that he had seen her many times before. Childhood years of the past spurred his throbbing heart, a rosy tinge beginning to heat up under his bangs.

Only one person called him by that nickname.

Like an unintentional answer to her inquiry, Junpei sputtered out her name. "A-Akane?"

Akane's face went bright with unspoken happiness. "Jumpy! It is you!" she said joyfully, squeezing his chest with a force that feared ever letting go.

"I can't believe it! This must me destiny that we're here together now! Oh thank goodness!" Akane exclaimed through one of Junpei's ears and out the other.

He was dazed and confused. Akane… how could this be?

"What are you doing here?" he managed to stumble out, relishing the pliable arms that embraced him.

Junpei had so many questions he _could_ ask Akane, like where she had gone to college, if she still researched ancient legends at the library, how many men she had dated from middle school to college… Question applications filed themselves behind the ones already standing in line. They would have to wait, because, depressing as it was, they couldn't dawdle under the monitor of Zero's dictatorship. Junpei was blown away by the turn of events, but on the other hand, he felt that fate was somehow to blame.

Loosening her hold and scooting back from his face, Akane blushed a similar shade of red to Junpei before folding her hands in her lap. "I… I was hiding from her." Akane gnawed her lip like whatever event she was speaking of was too difficult to remember.

"Who?" Junpei pressed Akane further. Sitting up on his knees, he crawled over and sat next to her.

Akane began fiddling with her thumbs and continued. "Another person with the number 6."

Junpei intuitively glanced at her left wrist. Sure enough, clamped over her striped arm warmer was a bracelet identical to Junpei's, with one difference; instead of a five, a number six blinked in its place.

"What did they do?" Junpei settled a hand on Akane's shoulder, stroking it through the folds in her dress.

"I'll start from the beginning." Akane told him, moving unconsciously closer to the touch.

"When I woke up this morning, I was in a hotel room. It was one of those fancy suites, like with a king-sized bed and a jacuzzi and everything. The first thing I noticed was this thing on my wrist." She pointed to the bracelet. "Once I found out that it wouldn't come off, I got up and started looking for a way out." Akane lifted her head to look at Junpei. "The door was in the living room, but it was locked. I went to go look for the key, when _it_ happened." Somehow, Junpei had a feeling of what she would say next.

"The same person who kidnapped me last night came on the TV and made some announcement about a game I was supposed to be part of. I'm guessing that the same thing happened to you from that look you're giving me, Jumpy." Akane smiled and Junpei jumped in mild surprise at how well she still recognized his expressions.

"After that, I found the key to the exit stuck between the spaces in the kitchen radiator. Don't ask me why it was there, because I have no idea" Akane said plainly.

"I solved a little puzzle and left the hotel room in a hurry, because there was somewhere I needed to go that Zero mentioned in his speech." Hugging her sleeves close to her stomach, Akane paled at the onset of the next part of her story.

"Once I got outside, I started running toward the most open-looking part of the city. On my way there, I bumped into…" Akane left her sentence to trail off.

"…Someone else."

Listening to Akane warily, Junpei prepared for the worst.

"It was a girl who looked about the same age as me, but she was a lot taller and had short blonde hair. I asked if she was okay because her clothes were soaked, like she'd been sweating for several hours. She didn't answer me, and looked straight at my wrist."

Akane turned away.

"The moment she saw I had the number 6, she screamed at me 'You're not winning this game!' and lunged. Her eyes were so unbelievable; they were like she had become some sort of feral animal. Holding out her arms like she was going to strangle me," Akane ghosted her fingers over her neck, speaking faster and in a more panicked tone, "-I turned around and made a break for it through an alley down the road. I knew that it would take her a minute to see me through the buildings if I took a path further away, so I used what little time I had to run into this café across the street." Whispers of choked oxygen replaced Akane's previously steady rhythm of breathing and Junpei pulled her to his side to try to calm her down.

"I've been in here ever since," Akane finished while attempting to curb her emotions, not wanting to look weak in front of Junpei. The concerned man wasn't fooled. Akane's jaw was trembling and her lower back felt knotted and tense against his knuckles.

Akane burst out, tears bubbling under her lashes. "Oh Jumpy, it was horrible!" Drops of salt trickled from Akane's eyes and she fiercely rubbed at them. "What was I s-supposed to d-do! S-sh-she was going to k-kill me!" Akane blubbered to Junpei, sniffling between suppressed hiccups.

"Whoa whoa! H-hey, it's okay!" Junpei fidgeting around with little idea of how to comfort a crying girl, but eventually settled on just holding her until the sobs died down.

Grateful that she could cry her heart out with Junpei by her side instead of hunched up in a ball, isolated in a storeroom, Akane dried her tears with renewed fervor. Jumpy was here; she had an ally, someone she could trust regardless of separation or circumstances. That fueled her the strength to rise above her fears and take charge of this game; she knew what she had to do.

"Um… Jumpy? Do you remember the thing Zero said about digital roots?"

Junpei flinched at the sudden control Akane had over her tone and nodded. "Yeah, something about adding up a groups' respective numbers until you get a single digit number? That was actually how I escaped the room I woke up in."

"Why do you think only 3-5 people can enter a numbered door?" Akane said like it was an easy question for Junpei.

Junpei didn't think he heard that right. "Wait, repeat that? Zero never said anything about there being a limit on people."

Akane tilted her head, perplexed. "What are you talking about Jumpy? Didn't you read the note?"

"Huh? What note?"

Akane dipped an arm in her boot. "When I woke up, other than the bracelet, there was this note in my hand." She retrieved a piece of folded paper and held it up for Junpei to see. "It detailed all this other stuff that wasn't in Zero's broadcast, like the rule that only three to five people could enter a numbered door at once. You mean to say you didn't wake up with a note like this, Jumpy?"

The brunette was in complete disbelief. How could he have missed something that important? Frantically searching every pocket he could find, Junpei turned up nothing but the key cards he had taken from his room. Akane watched, mouth parted as Junpei patted his vest furiously. He searched every crevice of his person, but in the end, realized that either he dropped the note back at the hotel, or didn't have it to begin with.

Akane regarded Junpei with pity and pushed the paper into his hands. Junpei fumbled and nearly dropped it, catching the note mid-fall between his thumb and pointer finger.

"Don't worry about it Jumpy, you can read mine! It'd probably be best that we read over the rules together anyway, so we know for sure what to do." Akane balled up her fingers and bumped them on her thighs with certainty.

Junpei opened the note, eager to learn what secrets had been hidden from him, and read.

"To the ninety players that I have given the privilege of playing the Urban Game, I shall bestow you with knowledge that will be the deciding factor of whether you live or die:

1. To open a numbered door, the digital root of your group of players must match the number on the door. Only 3-5 people may enter any numbered door at once, the only exception being the final door of the game. There cannot be more than 1 of each number in any given group entering a door and all that verified at the RED must enter.

2. Once all players have verified at the RED, they will have 9 seconds before the door closes. The moment all players enter, the deto-… "

Junpei lost his flow of words at the mention of the bombs planted in both of them. He was so geared towards getting out of that prison of a room that he had forgotten about the explosive ticking away inside his small intestine. It could go off at any time. Zero just had to press a button and Junpei's organs would be blown to oblivion, splattered in celebration around his decaying carcass. Knowing he needed to keep reading, Junpei jammed those thoughts to the back of his mind.

"-nators in your bracelets will activate and you will have 81 seconds to verify at the DEAD located within the room. Once all players verify at the DEAD, your detonators will deactivate.

3. There are only 2 ways to remove your bracelets. The first is if you escape the city. The second is if your heart rate reaches 0. Once the bracelet senses that its wearers' heart rate has reached 0, it will automatically shut down.

4. Last, but most vital to your survival, is the purpose of the rooms behind the numbered doors. In every room within a numbered door, there will be a key that can be used on one of the doors in the building of your escape: Building AZ. To reach the final door of this building, you will need one player of all numbers 1-9, and the key hidden in each numbered door.

Good luck. I await you at your final destination. –Zero"

Junpei stopped reading to see Akane ready to ask her question again. "So now that you know what I mean, why do you think Zero doesn't want more than five people in a door?"

Junpei wanted to sound smart, to have a logical conclusion to Zero's set of rules, but drew nothing but a blank. "I… dunno. Maybe so the teams are forced to split up? There really doesn't seem to be any reason other than to screw with us," he said while shrugging.

Akane agreed because she had thought the same thing, but pursed her lips like she wasn't truly satisfied. "Yeah, I guess that makes sense."

The space between them was uncomfortably weighted with the unknown. All their sources of information were laid out; Junpei and Akane had the rules on the note, Zero's broadcast, and proof that there were other players out there in the city. They had each other: their bond was so tightly wound that they fell back into the groove of their old friendship. Junpei accredited _that_ to Zero, as much as he didn't want to. Now, all they had to do was make a decision.

Akane broke the emptiness with a request.

"Jumpy, I need you to help me find someone."

"Hm?"

Akane placed her palm over her heart. "When I was kidnapped last night, there was another person with me. Someone very close to me. I know they were captured too; I just don't know where. No matter how far we have to go, I need you to help me find them," Akane pleaded.

"Please Jumpy, I don't think I can do this alone."

Any coldness that Junpei could have possibly contained melted away. Junpei was indebted to Akane just by virtue of her being alive and in person; they were connected with a delicate string forged from titanium.

"Of course. Who do you take me for, a complete jerk?" Junpei said, tossing her a smirk that shattered the serious moment.

Akane dropped her hand and giggled, but relief and thankfulness were present in the way she grinned at Junpei.

Both of them crouched to stand up. Junpei offered a hand to Akane. "So m'lady, where shall our first destination be?"

Akane giggled again, and replied, "I want to check out the edge of the city to see if what Zero said about being blockaded in was true. Who knows? Maybe he was bluffing and we could just walk right out any time we want."

Junpei highly doubted that, as did Akane, but they had to start somewhere.

"Alright. Let's go."

''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''

A wall. Rooted and unfaltering, it arched through the rays of sunlight. Thick steel plates were bolted together in nine solid bars of steel. Like a master to its subordinates, the wall presided over a labyrinth of cement stairs and walkways lined with black iron railings. The graffiti spray-painted along the layered ridges emphasized how much the steel rungs stood out of place, disrupting an otherwise normal scene of a skate park. The wall encircled the entire perimeter as far as Junpei and Akane could squint; it was a very real presence that drained all hope of just walking away, and leaving the Urban Game. Zero was thorough.

Junpei scratched his head. The light refracting off the steel hurt to look at directly. That was good; Junpei didn't think he could stand another second looking at the wall that sealed them into a complex, living torture chamber.

"Oh my… God…" Akane said distantly.

Junpei gently shook her. "C'mon… it's not worth it. Let's get out of here."

Snapping out of the sinister spell the wall had cast upon her, Akane didn't nod her head. "Maybe so… but I think we should look around this area some more before we leave. You never know, we might come across something useful." She jerked like it was a chore to rip her eyes away from the wall.

Trying to divert her attention from the barrier that sent tremors through her body, Junpei steered Akane toward the stairs overlooking a small parking garage.

The door to the garage was battered and rusted under a bright layer of white graffiti. Figuring Akane was finally breaking down from all the stress she had actively resisted until now, Junpei suggested she rest. "You should sit down on the stairs for a minute. I'll go walk around for us. The street next to that garage looks kinda suspicious, so I'm gonna check it out. Wait here for me, okay?"

Akane plopped onto the stairs and answered with a barely audible "mmhmm". Worried that the steel wall had stirred something inside her, Junpei dropped Akane's wrist and split off into the shadowed passageway.

Knowing Akane, she was probably anxious to find that person she mentioned. Junpei would be uneasy too if he got separated from someone he cared about.

Frowning, Junpei skimmed his hand along the brick wall opposite the skateboard park. The cement foundation of the park shaded the street from the beating sun and it made the rough bricks felt cool under his fingertips.

"There's a shitload of graffiti everywhere, but somehow, it just makes me feel like this place is even more deserted," Junpei muttered.

He could make out another street bathed in light up ahead. Knowing he should return to where Akane was waiting, Junpei was about to turn back, when he caught sight of an irregular patch in the brick wall further down. Deciding he could spare another minute, the college student sped up his pace.

Built sturdily into the rows of bricks was a broad wooden door. Like a loyal companion, hammered into the wall by its side, a bronze-red panel protruded a lever beside the gateway. Junpei must have won the jackpot on the _Wheel of Fortune_; slashed in bloody red streaks as a warning for the dangers that may or may not lie beyond the door, was a number.

"Five… five!" Junpei cried out louder. "Oh my God, I found it! A numbered door!" Delirious, Junpei shifted back and forth to make sure that it wasn't an illusion. A faint reminder panged in the back of his mind that they only had two people, but Junpei was too stoked to care. He had to tell Akane what he discovered! Sprinting through the corridor as fast as his feet could propel him, Junpei bounded into the sunlight-

-and stopped. Sneakers scratching against the pavement, Junpei craned his neck to see Akane in full posture, out of her seat.

The problem was, she wasn't alone.

"I'm sorry, but I can't go with you! I already have someone to be with!" Akane yelled insistently at three other figures grouped in front of the stairs.

Junpei slid behind the cover of the shaded corridor, flattening against a passage of graffiti that spelled "Quinary". He could kind of make out what the group and Akane were saying. Touching his ear to the corner of the foundation, Junpei studied the appearance of the other players.

The one on the left was burly and broad-shouldered. He wore an oversized green sweater that wrapped around his jeans in loose folds. Junpei gauged that the man was likely in his late-twenties, though he seemed more mature from the chiseled musculature of his jaw. The man was not friendly; Junpei could just tell from the sneering quirk of his nose. On his left wrist was the number "7".

Flanked on the right was a girl so thin and willowy that delicate little Akane could probably snap her in half. The girl's raven toned hair was pulled back into a long, kerchief-like trail at the base of her neck. Thigh-high black and white striped stockings graced her long bony legs, revealing a strap of skin just below her shorts. She was the one talking to Akane, demanding her to join their group. On her wrist was a "2".

To complete the trio, a composed, but slightly unstable looking young man folded his arms and stood in the center. He had worn, angular features that seemed to jut directly out of his skull. The bushy blonde hair that framed his face contrasted the sleek, stylish navy trench coat the man donned despite the warm weather. Junpei almost didn't want confirm what he had to see; backlit menacingly on the man's bracelet was the number "5".

Five. Junpei gulped and flashed back to Akane's tale of how someone nearly murdered her because she shared the same number. He was genre savvy enough to realize that the same fate would befall him if the other players noticed his presence.

Getting impatient, stockings girl stomped up to Akane. "Look, we're just trying to help you out! You're all alone and we need a number six on our team!"

"And I keep _telling_ you that I'm not by myself!" Akane repeated persistently. She held her hands in angry fists down at her hips. "I don't need any freaking team or whatever, I have someone else I need to find right now!"

"She keeps saying she isn't alone. Perhaps her friend hasn't come back yet?" the man in the trench coat spoke in such a low, regal monotone that Junpei could barely hear what he said.

'Stockings' swished her head over to him. "Yeah good call, he's probably around here somewhere. Hey Lucky, why don't you scope out the place?" she gestured to the thickly built man.

Lucky, in all his glory of unfitting names, cracked his neck and grunted. Taking long, drawn out steps like he was merely on a stroll through the woods, the burly man walked past Akane toward the parking garage. A stifled whimper flew from Akane's lips and she smacked her hand over her mouth.

With a flicker of his eyes as fast as lightning, 'Trench' detected Akane's telltale reaction.

"It appears that the young lady doesn't want you to go over there Lucky." 'Trench' wore a smug half-smile. "I do believe you should venture further to see what all the commotion is about."

Akane mouthed "Oh no" and held her breath. Trained on the two players, she made to back away, but unfortunately, could only go so far without bumping her calves against the stairs.

With a numb inclination that something bad was going to happen, Junpei retreated further into the alley as Lucky approached. Unable to see Akane and the other two players, Junpei tried to rack his instincts for anything he could do to distract them.

Anything. What could Junpei come up with? He prayed for his clever genes to kick in, wishing for a brilliant epiphany that would save them in the knick of time. Anything…

…It was futile, and Junpei knew it. Lucky would expose him in three… two… one…

Akane's shrieks echoed through the walls.

"NO! LET ME GO! Get off me you nasty cow!"

Junpei could hear the irritated orders of 'Stockings' and 'Trench' over Akane.

"Dammit! Cover her mouth Liam or she'll call the whole fucking town!"

Liam's voice was disturbingly nonchalant. "Excuse me, but who exactly is holding the precious flower? She's already leaving bruises on my-"

Akane roared again and Junpei picked up signals of an increasingly violent struggle.

The silhouette of a mountain blocked out the sky. Junpei's head shot up and he cursed himself for getting distracted.

"Hm, what do we have here? A rookie replacement that was never worth the cop he replaced?" Lucky said.

Junpei, taken aback by the nonsense Lucky rambled in his face, was lost. Akane was in danger and Junpei was up against a man that could feasibly deck Rocky Balboa off a cliff. Every minute was another foot of distance between him and Akane.

Lucky growled at Junpei ignoring him. "Looks like the ball of litter is too stubborn to be thrown in the trash. I can fix that little man!" Seemingly pulling this stuff out of nowhere, Lucky swung his fist into the cement.

At the last second, Junpei dodged the blow and rolled under the man's elbow. Thinking of nothing more than "Akane is in danger, I have to save Akane", Junpei rushed past Lucky to the stairway.

He got there with little time left. Liam had one hand latched over her mouth. She thrashed her legs around, desperately trying to break away.

Utter shock spread over Junpei's face as Lucky cut him off with speed and grace that seemed impossible for a man of his bulk.

"Ah, ah, ah, can't let you do that. Recyclables go in the bin to be _melted down_."

The burly man was backing him into the angle where the stairs and the garage met, pounding his fists together. Junpei imagined himself being bludgeoned over the head and thrust to the ground like a discarded doll. It would be the last thing he ever saw.

Lucky grabbed Junpei by his sweatshirt.

He couldn't put up a fight worth a moment of life. Junpei hung languidly from Lucky's grip as the man lifted him off the ground. Lucky raised his fist.

"Nighty-night!"

Akane bit Liam's fingers and he yelped. Free, she cried out.

"NO, JUNPEEEEIIII!"

Tears splattered over her cheeks and Liam silenced her again.

It was all over. Junpei closed his eyes.

"…"

A gunshot exploded through the sky. Piercing the gravel no more than a mere inch from 'Stocking's' heels, smoke lazily drifted from the smoldering asphalt.

Everyone stopped. Lucky's fist halted in front of Junpei's forehead. 'Stockings' reeled backwards and her brow shot up. Akane fell limp in Liam's hold.

Junpei looked up to the source of the bullet.

Seated with his legs crossed upon an iron rail, was a young man. Cocked in his left hand with no hesitation to fire again, a golden revolver glinted coolly in the sun. Without any introduction, the man leapt from the roof and landed in a crouch with the revolver at his side.

Flowing in feathery wisps from the man's head blew strands of bleach white hair. He wore a thin scarf and tank top and wide cargo pants tucked into shoes that resembled snowboard boots. Bending to stand, the man swept the gun to point it directly between Liam's eyes.

Junpei marveled at how much contrast could be demonstrated within a lone individual. Black and white like shades of mood swings; the golden revolver looked so out of place with his index finger twitching on the trigger. He was pristinely pale and slender, yet muscles shone brightly in mounds of opaque ice along his shoulders. Feminine. Junpei's couldn't help admitting the scowling man was pretty like an androgynous girl.

Junpei's latter impression was instantly dispelled the moment the man opened his mouth.

"What the fuck are you dipshits just standing there for! I've got five more bullets loaded in this fucker with your name on them if you don't drop the girl! You've got ten seconds to haul your sorry asses out of here!" the man spewed, his feminine features contorting into veiny bulges of rage.

'Stockings' and Liam gaped like captured fish, rivulets of sweat pooling on their faces.

"H-holy…" 'Stockings' creaked out, her eyes expanding like saucers. She couldn't see anything else other than the gun aimed at Liam.

"One, two…"

Heavily, she spoke.

"Liam, drop the girl."

Liam glared at her, appalled. "But Lulu, we might never find another-"

"I SAID, DROP THE GIRL!" Lulu commanded viciously.

"…"

Reluctant but defeated, Liam slowly lowered a straining Akane to the ground like he was bargaining a sacrifice.

The white-haired man smirked and turned the gun sideways at the two thieves.

"Good. Now take that fatass partner of yours with you and be on your merry way."

Liam took a step away from Akane, looking hard at the bracelet on Junpei's wrist. Junpei knew what he was thinking; Lucky still had and iron grip on Junpei's body. The college student was a threat to Liam's security. Lucky could crush Junpei's spinal cord in an instant, leaving one less number five player to roam Zero's city.

It was no contest. A bullet was faster than a fist.

"Lucky, let's go." Liam said finally.

Lucky released his hold and Junpei dropped unceremoniously onto the pavement. The college student massaged his tailbone, wincing, as Lucky joined the other third of the trio. His face was stone cold when he brushed past Akane, who was grinding her lips at the white-haired man like she was dying to say something.

The brash man waved the revolver at the retreating trio. "That's right. Get the hell out of here. I never want to see your piss ugly faces again. YOU HEAR ME!" he snarled arrogantly, teeth gritted with barely concealed anger.

Afraid that the unpredictable man would come after them, the trio skittered off like a herd of frightened sheep.

"Bunch of wusses. Pisses me off." The young man mumbled, lowering the revolver.

Recovering from his very first run in with death, Junpei felt woozy and out of any energy whatsoever, but mentally slapped himself to wake up. They were in a worse situation than what they started with. There was a crazy guy with a gun near Akane. _A loaded gun_. Junpei didn't want to take any chances; the man may have saved them, but the way he threatened those other players unnerved Junpei more than made him want to be friends.

The college student was about to carry out his plan when Akane got to her feet. Her expression was a mix between awe and shaky elation.

Plotting to lock the white-haired man down with a hold when he wasn't looking, Junpei made to sprint behind him when Akane rushed into the silver man's arms.

"You're safe! Oh… gosh, you don't know how worried I was!" she said with a shining smile, hugging the fierce man warmly like he hadn't just threatened to blow three people to smithereens.

Baffled and wondering what the hell just happened, Junpei ceased his chase.

The white-haired man's features softened under the caress of Akane's silky hair. He changed before Junpei's very eyes from a furious, gun-toting madman to something almost unrecognizable. It was like his magnetic field had reversed polarity.

"S'okay Akane. No one's gonna take you away. I've got you," the man whispered soothingly to her. Sheathing the gun in his pocket with the safety catch on, the pale man shifted to wrap his own arms around her.

Junpei couldn't believe what he was seeing. A stab of jealousy stung his heart and he snuck closer to the serene pair. Who was this guy that Akane seemed so intimate with?

The other man said something quietly in Akane's ear. Unable to make it out, Junpei harrumphed and crossed his arms ardently, waiting for them to finish their oh-so-precious moment.

Calmer, the pair separated and Akane darted over to Junpei to give him a quick hug as well.

"You're not hurt are you Jumpy? Please tell me that big guy didn't break one of your ribs or something!" Akane's rampant concern was genuine, but Junpei was too busy steaming about the white-haired man to notice.

"I'm fine" Junpei said stiffly. "Thanks."

Junpei tapped his foot on the pavement. "Pardon me for asking, but who is this guy?"

Akane gasped and let go. "Oh yeah, I'm sorry Jumpy! You're probably so confused." She moved back to the white-haired man's side.

"This is the person I asked you to help me look for! I wasn't expecting us to find him so soon, but it looks like we got luckier than we thought. Isn't this so great? Now we have three people in our group!" she said while beaming.

Junpei was not happy. He wrinkled his nose at the other man.

Leaning back casually, the silverette cocked one eye at Junpei, sizing him up. The stood there glaring at each other until the white-haired man slid a hand through his headband and spoke.

"So your name's Junpei? What connection do you have with Akane?"

"I was her childhood friend. We met up in the city after we both escaped our rooms. We decided to stick together to go looking for you."

"Oh… yeah. Akane mentioned something like that." The other man spaced out like he wasn't really interested.

Feeling the excruciating tension between the two men, Akane tried to lighten the atmosphere.

She clapped her hands together. "Okay! Now that we've got that all squared away, why don't we talk about what to do next?"

Junpei thought Akane was being way too optimistic about their predicament. He, no way, no how, trusted this strange guy, no matter how close Akane was to him. Junpei uncrossed his arms and prepared to make a comment about the relation the other player had to Akane, when said man interrupted him.

"Well, first of all, I've got an idea. Those other players that ran off actually had a pretty good thing going."

"Huh, what do you mean?" Akane asked.

The silverette looked at Akane seriously. "You didn't think that those were their real names they were using, did you? Shit like Liam, Lucky, and Lulu—man, that sounds like some preschool playhouse cartoon—they're codenames. Those players were hiding information about themselves to protect their identity," he said conclusively.

Grudgingly impressed—the other man was sharper than he looked—Junpei had to agree. "Wow… that is a pretty clever idea. So what are you saying, that we should have codenames too?"

"Exactly." The white-haired player showed his wrist to Junpei. Jolted back into the omnipresence of the Urban Game after seeing the red bracelet, he said the other man's number out loud.

"3… yeah, so?"

"We'll use our numbers to make up our nicknames. Like I want mine to be, let's see… Santa. You know, cuz 'san' means three in Japanese" he added.

Akane piped up. "But what happens if we find more players? Zero said we need one of each number."

"Then we'll just have to figure out what to do when that time comes" Santa stated. "Considering we've already been attacked once, we're gonna have to be really careful about who we trust." Santa indicated towards Junpei out of the corner of his eye. Only Junpei caught it. The college student sneered at Santa.

"'kay Jumpy, you're next. What do you want your codename to be?"

Junpei thought about the number five and the things usually associated with it. He cycled through several names, before choosing-

"Hup! Wait a minute, I don't think that's necessary." Santa held up his palm like a traffic director.

"But you just said that all of us need codenames A-Ao-ah, I mean, Santa!" Akane protested.

Junpei wondered what Akane was about to call Santa when the silver man clarified what he meant.

"Remember when you were being dragged off and you bit that guy's hand? You yelled out his-" he thumbed towards Junpei,"-name. There's no way those players would forget it after you screamed it so loud. He's Junpei."

Akane and Junpei paused for the bluntness of Santa's words to sink in, and clasping her hands, Akane gradually flushed a bashful beet-red. She threw her hands up.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so, so sorry, Jumpy! That was so stupid of me to yell your name out like that! Now you'll be in trouble all because of me!" she apologized frantically, scrambling for some way to make it up to him.

She pointed her finger up. "Oh, I know! How about I don't have a codename either, because it wouldn't be fair, and all-"

Junpei plopped a hand on her head, cutting her off. "Hey, don't worry about it!" He ruffled her hair as playfully as he could muster, trying to brush it off as no big deal. "Fake names were never my style anyway. I'm much too cool for playing pretend." He removed his hand, sifting strands of her hair through his fingers before pulling away.

Akane drooped forward, "Alright… if you say so…"

Santa cleared his throat, annoyed at Junpei being so close to Akane. "Anyway, moving on. Akane, what do you want for a codename?"

Akane pressed her thumb to her mouth. "Hmmmm… I don't know. Why don't you pick one for me, Jumpy?"

"Um, okay. How about… June? It's the sixth month of the year."

"June… yeah, that's a really good name, Jumpy! I'll use that."

Santa rubbed his neck. "Well then, it's settled. Now all we have to do is pick a place to go." He scanned the other two, prodding them for ideas.

Akane nudged Junpei. "Hey Jumpy. You never told me what was down that street. Did you find anything?"

Did he find anything… find something… the door… The door! Junpei had totally lost sight of what he had originally come to tell Akane a half-hour ago. The numbered door! They could get a head start on Zero's game right away now that they had three people!

Excited, Junpei was about to blurt out the location of his discovery, when the rules of Zero's game hindered his path. They may have three people, but if their digital root wasn't five, they weren't going anywhere. Briefly, Junpei calculated his, June's, and Santa's numbers in his head.

5+6=11+3=14… 1+4=…5. Flabbergasted that the numbers matched so perfectly, Junpei ran the calculation again and came out with the same result. Their group had a digital root of five! It was unfathomable how auspicious the first day of the Urban Game was turning out.

"Listen! Down that street was… you won't believe this, but I already have our advantage to this game."

Both Santa and June leaned in, eagerly curious to hear what Junpei had to say.

"I already found it. A numbered door."

Their eyes went wide.

"But that's not all. I've found that particular numbered door that we-" he spun his finger around,"-can enter with just the three of us." Junpei turned his lip, expectant.

"Holy shit dude, why didn't you say so before?" Santa jittered with anticipation. "Stop beating around the goddamn bush and tell us where it is!"

Junpei continued after sufficiently building up the anxious air. "Over in that alleyway, is the number five door. What is our digital root?"

June and Santa though for a moment and, figuring it out, their faces lit up again.

"Our digital root is five! We can go right now!" June exclaimed at Junpei, willing him to lead them there immediately.

Junpei nodded, feeling a bold willpower set into his body.

"Damn, I can't believe it. It's almost kinda scary how perfect that turned out." Santa said with and hint of suspicion. It wasn't that he didn't believe Junpei; it was more the fear of what was behind that door that bothered him.

"We shouldn't miss our chance."

With that, Junpei waved for them to follow him. Before they reached the patch of shade, June called to the two boys.

"Maybe, just before we go, we should get some supplies. Zero said we only have ten days. We don't know if there will be any food behind that door."

June's suggestion was plenty practical, and the men concurred to go grab some food from the café.

They would meet back in about seven minutes, and enter the number five door.


	3. Chapter 3

**To the reviewers:**

**SwirlzSmile:** Thanks, I glad that the story is keeping your interest ^_^.

**Naridar:** Oh, gosh *blush*. One of the best, wow. I don't know about that, but thank you. It's so awesome that you mentioned Devil Survivor, because that's one of my favorite games for DS (it can be _really_ hard though, seriously ). Actually I'm pretty shameless; I stole the term 'players' from The World Ends With You (it just happened to fit the setting). Also, to answer your question, Santa is still June's brother in this version. The whole ambiguity about it comes from the fact that _Junpei_ doesn't know he's her brother, so he thinks Santa's like her boyfriend. All will be cleared up in a few chapters ^_~.

**Mexican wine:** Ooo, you caught that *smirk*. The whole thing about Akane's room vs. Junpei's was a little joke I put in there for some subtle laughs ^^. Of course, _the lady_ would get the fancy suite!

**Niamy Tak:** Oh yeeeessss, competition there will be, though not in a friendly way, no, not at all O_o.

As for the note, my lips are sealed *ziiiip*.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors_. It belongs to Aksys Games and the vault of epicness.

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The fairytale prince of myth and legend. Did he exist? To be a prince held a certain connotation; a prince had to be handsome and majestic, but also polite and not above the subjects that worshipped him. A prince was intelligent and knew many things of relevance to the word around him. He would not hesitate to share this knowledge if it would help someone in need. That was all Clover cared about; smarts, something to compliment her perpetually silly and carefree demeanor. She had a model prince to base her fantasies on. However, her relationship with her prince had no need for romance, only trust.

Those were Clover's thoughts as she diffused in and out of dreamland. Curled into a pillow with her pink hair filtering over the covers, the cheery girl slept soundly, undisturbed by the chaotic city around her.

Gliding his fingers over every rift of the room he could feasibly reach, a tall man with sleek gray hair brought a hand to his chin.

"Hm, fascinating." The regal man drew a precise diagram of the room in his mind.

They were in a classic-style Japanese bedroom. Pieces of furniture sat low to the ground, flat and angular with the unmistakable symmetry of a three-star inn. Thin screens of paper lined the south wall, the sliding door locked by the presence of a levered machine stamped to the wall next to it. Two futons lay on the carpet. One was occupied; the adorable whistles of a slumbering girl came from it. The other had the covers tucked neatly around the mattress. The man that had once woken upon it was now thoroughly examining the room, making reasonable sense of what he'd recently heard broadcasted on the television.

He and Clover had been inducted into a dangerous game. The perpetrator, a person he had no knowledge of appearance wise, was named a puzzling title: Zero. The number of negative space. He was quite sure that Zero was responsible for sealing them inside this room.

Once the man in the embroidered suit painted a decent picture of their current situation, he padded over to the sleeping girl and kneeled next to her.

He shook her abdomen softly. "Clover, wake up. You must see this." He meant that in a more literal sense than most people would assume.

"Mmmmm… Light? Why are you in my room?" the pink-haired girl groaned, a yawn crawling its way out of her mouth. Her muscles shuddered as she stretched her arms over her head and sat up.

Clover's eyes fluttered open. She clutched the blankets and looked around, bewildered.

"Huh? Where are we?" she asked Light. A square piece of paper tumbled from her fingers onto the futon.

"Apparently, we are within the confines of a city. A city owned by the one named Zero." Light knew it was uncouth to spring this on Clover so suddenly, but he summated that the sooner they escaped this room, the better.

Clover furrowed her brow. "Whatcha talkin' about, big brother?" She tossed the covers away and was about ask him to explain properly when she spotted something on her brother's left wrist.

"Lemme see that." Light was at first unsure what she was referring to until she took his hand, bringing the bracelet closer to her face.

"2? You said something about some Zero guy, is that where this weird thing came from?"

Clover was repeating what Light had formerly deduced, with one exception. Now he was aware that a number two blinked upon the face of his bracelet.

The pink-haired girl tilted her pigtails back and forth, scrutinizing the object. She clicked the buttons with her left hand.

Clover breathed a sound of surprise. She let go of Light's wrist and twiddled with the bracelet on her own wrist. "H-hey, I have one too! Except mine's a '4'."

Becoming increasingly agitated by the wash of strange new things that were being poured over her head, Clover pouted.

"What's going on?" she whined, rising to stand. Light rose with her.

"Who's Zero? What do you know that I don't, big brother?" Clover didn't mean to be rude, but she hated being in the dark about important stuff, especially when it involved her brother.

Light tuned down to her high-pitched voice. "While you were still asleep, I awoke and began scouting the area for clues on how to escape."

Clover saw the screen doors behind Light. She didn't see how they couldn't just slide them open and walk right out until her eyes trailed over the metal box on the adjacent wall. Clover wasn't dumb; she guessed that the box was what kept them locked in.

"During my search the television turned on, on its own—certainly remote-controlled from outside this building—and I heard a distorted voice introduce itself as 'Zero'. He—if he is actually male—spoke of the Urban Game, and said that we were players participating in it," Light relayed to his younger sister. He continued to tell her about digital roots, the bombs planted inside them, and about the numbered doors.

"That's all I know."

With every concept that Light conveyed, Clover's insides swelled larger and pulsed with fear. She felt the greatest distress from the mention of the bombs; it was an insecurity that she had no control over. Crazy math mumbo-jumbo about digital roots and numbered doors she could handle, but the fact that there was an explosive lodged within the fleshy tubes of her body made her turn green.

"Wow… th-that's pretty messed up." She wavered and didn't say anything more to her brother. Her chest pounded in her ears.

Light predicted that his anecdote would not sit well with Clover. He placed both hands on her jacket.

"It'll be all right Clover. If we stay together and use our knowledge carefully, we can overcome any obstacle Zero might throw at us." Light's words felt hollow with no substance, but that didn't matter as long as they comforted Clover. "We don't have any time to waste. Let's search the room to see if we can overturn a key. That should be our first goal."

Clover, feeding off the positive vibes surging from her brother's touch, peeped a little smile. Light… her brother always knew what to do. He was a master of cognition, calm and rational in a crisis; Clover could defeat any doubts when her brother was around.

Lending her eyes to Light, the pink-haired girl reexamined the parts of the room that her brother could not see.

They would make it.

Clover… and her prince.

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Bleary as it set over the horizon, the sun cast its glow over a dark alleyway.

Three young adults congregated in front of a rusted door.

"Looks like we're all set. You got our rations, Santa?" Junpei said.

Santa toted a plastic bag stuffed with pastries and condiments. "Duh. Can we go now, or are you gonna keep asking me stupid questions, Captain Obvious?"

"Jeez, I was just making sure," Junpei grumbled. The silver man was beginning to tick him off already.

Choosing to ignore her companion's little dispute, June approached the 'RED' scanner panel.

"So all we have to do is put our hand on this panel right?" She hovered her hand near it. "I'll try first."

Unconsciously holding her breath, June moved her hand forward for what seemed to take an eternity, before her palm pressed against the metal.

The RED beeped and an asterisk symbol appeared on the screen in place of the word 'VACANT'. June hopped back from it hastily.

"I guess it worked. The red thing must mean it registered you." Junpei thought it was simple enough. He copied June and another asterisk blinked on the verification screen.

"You're last Santa," June said, her and Junpei gathering near the door to prepare themselves.

Slinging the bag over his shoulder, Santa walked up and brushed his hand to the scanner panel. A third asterisk joined the others.

This was it. None of them knew what lay in store for them behind door number five. It was terrifying, but the prospect of finding a key to their escape aroused excitement in their hearts. It was either take the risk or… find out exactly what Zero meant by 'permanently'.

Junpei closed his hand around the lever. The three leaned in.

"Ready?"

Santa and June nodded and locked in all their focus on the door. Junpei prayed it would work and their well of luck wouldn't dry up unexpectedly the moment he lowered his hand.

Junpei pulled the lever.

Three succinct beeps chimed from the RED. Creaking like an entrance gate to the final dungeon, the door moaned open.

Junpei, June, and Santa leapt inside.

The second they crossed over the threshold, the countdown of a timer sounded from their bracelets.

All three glanced at their wrists. Backlit behind their numbers was a red skull.

Skull… death.

A bomb.

The DEAD.

"Quick, find the DEAD!" Santa screamed at Junpei and June, who were momentarily frozen by the slam of the door shutting behind them.

A short hallway pealed out on front with a single door at the finish line. Chemical streams of adrenaline flooded their churning blood and the trio sprung into action, barreling down the hallway.

Frantically whipping their faces around to find it, the device that would judge them innocent and clear them of the ultimate penalty, their footsteps shook the walls like a hurricane of turbulence.

Junpei reached the end of the hall first, nearly smashing into the double doors from the sheer momentum of his body. There, bolted and waiting, was a blue replica of the RED.

"HERE! Right here!" Junpei tore out more as a confirmation of the machine's existence than as a direction. Junpei yanked his hand behind his head and slammed it on the panel.

"MOVE!" Santa shoved Junpei aside and put his own palm on the device, followed by a stumbling June.

The silver man forcefully gripped the handle and thrust his arm down. Three low beeps responded from the group.

Junpei panted and gasped with a craving for more oxygen than he ever needed in his life. On his bracelet, there was only a five. The skull was gone.

"*pant*It's g-gone *pant* Oh my god…" Junpei chuckled, choking on his own saliva. "It stopped. The c-countdown… stopped. Haa… ha ha… Ahahahaha!" Red circles burned on his cheeks.

He felt drunk, laughing with nothing funny to laugh about. He was alive. The bomb didn't explode.

"Hahaha!" He heaved over and coughed roughly, but couldn't stop. "Ah haha… Ugh…" Junpei's stomach gurgled and Junpei fought back the urge to hurl.

June and Santa wheezed beside him. June was giving Junpei a concerned frown, wisps of struggling air circulating from her rosy lips. Santa hunched over with his hands on his knees, traces of sweat gleaming on his forehead.

"Shit… I think I uh… pulled a muscle." Santa cringed through his teeth and dug a fist into his lower back.

Able to breath through his nose again, Junpei snorted at the other man's discomfort. "What, you worn out already? We haven't even gotten to the first level yet."

Two doors pulled open behind them.

"Well, wha' do you expect after busting in like that so fast! Christ, I'm not made of iron. Besides, what was your little freak out about, spaz? You were laughing all psychotic like you were high off crack!" Santa spat back at Junpei.

"Guys."

Junpei grimaced and diverted his eyes from Santa, the truth of the insult a blow to his ego. "I was… that was…" He fumbled for a good comeback.

"_Guys._"

"W-well…" Junpei snatched up his words. "Who was the one saying we should trust each other? I don't think shoving your teammate into the-"

"GUYS!" June yelled at the boys, stomping her foot in the middle of them.

Santa and Junpei jumped, glowered at each other, and turned to the irritated girl.

June was deeply troubled that the two people closest to her were having issues getting along. However, the hours they had left on their first day were limited. As much as she despised fighting, hated and _loathed_ any sort of conflict, June thought it was best shut away her own feelings and work towards recovering the key for the time being.

"Come look at this."

The trio stepped through the double doors.

Exquisitely decorated and expanding the nearly size of a football field, was an early 20th century style ballroom. Hundreds of handcrafted dining chairs conversed around round tables, two sets lining each side of the dance floor. Rows of painted wood columns mingled between dining areas. The trio could smell the old antique spice of hardwood; unsurprising with a dance floor that stretched the entire length of the room. Parked at the very edge of the floor was a line of tables covered in linens, a central staircase leading from the right to a small, elevated balcony. Oil lamps flickered upon the surrounding wall, paying tribute to the extravagantly decorated chandelier dangling in the center of the floor.

"It's… beautiful," Junpei said.

"Uh-huh…" Santa replied.

Junpei smiled at the men's identical gaping faces. Hadn't they just been arguing just a moment ago? Boys were so fickle about their emotions sometimes.

"Isn't it? Zero must be extremely rich to pull off something like this," June commented. She bent down to feel the glossy finish of the dance floor.

Santa and Junpei snapped out of their respective mind zones and followed June to see what she was doing.

"This glaze feels brand new. I wonder what Zero is planning to use this ballroom for—it's so elaborate," June remarked to the two boys.

Junpei acknowledged that June's deduction was interesting, but not important.

"Zero does seem to be quite the entrepreneur, " he said offhandedly. "Anyways, I think we should split up. We'll cover more ground in less time."

June and Santa agreed and the trio separated in three different directions. June went off among the dining tables and Santa left the bag of food on a chair. The silver man admired the gorgeous room some more as he strode over to the row of rectangular, white tables.

Junpei remained on the pathway near the entrance. A few unanswered pieces information churned through his head and he checked to see where June had gone. She was over next to the pillar farthest away from the staircase, peering under tablecloths, humming merrily to herself. Her back was turned from the dance floor.

Tensing his lip, Junpei walked to the opposite end of the ballroom.

He came up beside Santa, who was inspecting the vase of roses on the centermost table, a pale hand on his hip.

The silver man slanted his head to one side. "What're flowers doing here… they're not wilted or anything," he said, rubbing his scalp. "There's nothin' else on these tables, so…" He continued to mumble at the roses, not noticing Junpei's presence.

Junpei stepped closer and tapped Santa on the shoulder. Startled, the white-haired man whirled around.

"Oh hey, Junpei. What 're you doing over here? I thought you were gonna look somewhere else."

Junpei said nothing and stared down the other man.

Unperturbed, Santa laced his arms together. "These tables are strange. They're all lined up like their supposed to be important, but there's nothing on them 'cept these flowers." He nudged his elbow at the vase. "Kinda reminds me of those judging booths, you know, the ones that you see at dance competitions and stuff, where they hold up the numbers. Guess that wouldn't make sense for something as old as a 20th century ballroom, though."

Junpei drifted his eyes toward the tables, but didn't turn any part of his body away from Santa. An idea occurred to him.

"You know what these tables are for? They were probably buffet tables for when people had serving parties," Junpei explained to Santa. "You see the cart on the end? Waiters use those to bring out new dishes and silverware."

Santa observed the cart Junpei had pointed out that he didn't see before. He figured that Junpei was right.

Annoyed that the conversation had begun so far from where he wanted it to be, Junpei resumed pinning down the other man intensely with his gaze.

"Santa, I have a few questions I want to ask you."

Disliking the vibes of contempt that were seeping from the college student, Santa narrowed his eyes. He would behave for now, just for June's sake.

"Okay, I'm all ears. Fire away."

Junpei started with the easiest. "Where did you get that gun?"

Santa touched the pocket of his cargo pants. "Oh yeah… guess I didn't really say much about that…" He met Junpei's piercing eyes again, thumbing the top of his pocket to busy his hand with something. "After I left my room this morning, I went into town to look for something that could help me find June. While I was wandering around, I saw an… 'unusual' kind of store on the end of the sidewalk."

Junpei had no idea what Santa meant by 'unusual' until the silver man proceeded with his story.

"It was a pawn shop. Antiques and collectible crap were useless to me, but I thought that there might be a laptop or phone in there I could test out, so I took a quick look. Lot of good that did," Santa lamented.

"The place was deserted. All of the display cases were completely empty like the shop'd gone out of business years ago. I figured it was pointless to bother looking around, but there was something weird on the counter that caught my attention."

Santa shivered lightly and clutched his sleeves. "A coffin. An honest to God, creepy as hell, coffin. Damn thing made me nearly shit my pants. I went over and checked it out. The thing was really well made and it wasn't covered in dust—it was like it'd been put there just yesterday. Anyhow, I opened it up."

If he had known anything less, Junpei would have expected the coffin to have a dead body in it. Since this was Santa's story though, it was actually something quite different.

"Inside… was the gun. At the time, I couldn't believe what I found. I mean… _a gun. _ _With bullets in it_. Zero was seriously fucking with us players. Why else would it've been there other than to give a huge advantage to the first person who found it? 'Kinda implies Zero put it there on purpose just to stir shit up," Santa left off, a few slivers of guilt worming their way onto his face.

"So… I took it," Santa admitted a little sheepishly. "It's a damn good thing I did too, or you and June would've been totally screwed over."

Junpei didn't flinch one centimeter at the justification. Santa fell quiet for a moment.

"That sufficiently answer your question?"

"Mmhm," Junpei responded, his frown staunchly etched in place.

Santa waited.

"Fair enough."

Junpei flashed two fingers. "Question number two: Where did you wake up this morning?"

Santa wrinkled his forehead oddly at Junpei. "Isn't that obvious? I woke up in a locked room like you and June. Zero gassed me the night before and put the number three on my arm."

"I'm not talking about the room. I meant _where_, as in where in the city."

"Oh," Santa said, somewhat affronted by Junpei's tone of voice. "Well jeez, be a little more specific."

Santa leaned back, trying to recall his memory. "I think I was put in some kind of shopping district. There were lots of clothing stores and specialty shops around, and not much else." He shrugged indifferently. "Can't really tell you any more."

Junpei wasn't done yet. "How did you wind up at the skate park, then?"

Santa raised his head at the more complicated question. "Aren't we the curious one? Fine… I wound up over there after getting the idea that June might be at the barrier. She always had a habit of walking around the edge of the river before diving in. Think like the target to be in their shoes, ya know? S'coincidence that you two were getting your asses captured right when I got there."

The silver man sighed bleakly. "We done yet?"

Santa felt himself getting tired of rambling and wished Junpei would just be satisfied already. No such luck: Junpei poked three fingers in the bleached man's personal space, particularly determined about this next question.

"No," Junpei spoke sharply, "I have one last question. Now, I want you to answer me this honestly and without any wiseass remarks." Junpei rolled his arm back, displaying three fingers at Santa firmly.

"Question. Number. Three: What is your relationship to June?"

Junpei narrowed his eyes. Demons of passionate jealousy swirled around his emotions, irrational accusations bombarding his thoughts.

No primary reaction. Santa merely blinked at him. Then, deliberately, like a crater of boiling lava rising to the peak of a dormant volcano, livid heat trickled up Santa's face.

Santa trembled, body shaking uncontrollably, and exploded. "That's none of your fucking beeswax, prying little douchebag! What's between June and I has nothing to do with you!"

"I have a right to know!" Junpei pursued insistently. The green-eyed monster sunk its claws into Junpei and grinned viciously, its fangs protruding over his head.

"You're hiding something from me! You think I'm stupid? If I'm gonna trust you—with Akane's safety," Junpei added quickly to cover up his anger, forgetting to use her codename, "—then I have to know just who the hell you really are!"

Santa looked at Junpei haughtily and snickered. His mouth wriggled up knowingly.

"You're jealous, aren't you?" he accused, prodding the air in front of Junpei. He pointed back at his chest. "Of me. You're all bent out of shape over your precious preteen crush because I was the one who rescued her!" He smirked wryly at Junpei, but his expression was bitter and held a hint of subtle protectiveness. "Well Junpei, I can assure you that _there is_—" Santa swung his hand back angrily-

-and hit his knuckles on course metal. Standing behind them, knees wobbling slightly from the weight of her load, was June.

Both men snapped their mouths shut and whipped around to regard opposite ends of the ballroom. Santa folded one elbow behind his head and Junpei pretended to be enamored with picking lint off his polo. June almost expected them to start whistling.

"Hey guys, look what I found!" Junpei declared brightly.

Junpei and Santa innocently turned back to June to see her discovery.

In June's arms, primitive with a scent like rusted yen coins, was an old record player. A long, gold-plated horn protruded from the box and obscured most of June's face. She rocked onto her toes, suddenly unstable.

"Eeek!"

"Whoa, June!"

Junpei lurched forward to catch June and the worn contraption. He steadied June back onto her heels and took the record player from her, setting it on the table.

June balled a hand on her chest and smiled. "Whew! Thanks Jumpy!" She flushed and wrung out her hands. "But… of course I could've carried it by myself…" she said, embarrassed.

Glad that June didn't fall and injure herself, Junpei switched his focus over to the record player. "A record player, eh? Nice. Where'd you find it?"

"It was on the chair all the way in the corner there. I didn't see anything else that looked remotely interesting."

Santa walked over to the record player and skimmed his thumb over the rod fastened to the top of the wooden box. "It's in pretty good shape for such an old model. The gold paints' not even chipped." He knocked on the wood. "Don't really get why it's here though, other than to prove that Zero is a stickler for preservation."

A record player. Well… they _were_ in a ballroom. Junpei didn't surmise the machine was out of place, at least. What was Zero trying to tell them?

Like two peas in a pod, June announced exactly what Junpei was thinking. "You know what I was thinking?" she said to Santa and Junpei, "—that the record player is part of puzzle Zero set up for us. Like the ones we had to solve to escape our hotel rooms." She gestured to the dance floor. "We _are_ in a ballroom. It would make sense that playing music has something to do with what we're supposed to figure out."

June's surprisingly reasonable conjecture was likely correct; Junpei didn't deny that, but he couldn't help but feel something was missing. If they had to solve a puzzle, then wouldn't that mean the puzzle was meant to unlock something?

Unlock… an exit! The thought of there being an exit from the ballroom never even crossed Junpei's mind! Divulging his attention from the record player for a moment, Junpei flailed around, searching for another door.

"Junpei, what're you doing?" Santa questioned the college student. Junpei appeared to be spazzing out again.

"Looking for the exit," Junpei said briskly, freezing once he spotted two handled double doors at the top of the staircase. "Eureka!" He took off and jogged up the stairs, Santa and June following him curiously with their eyes.

Reaching the top of the balcony, Junpei ran to the doors and immediately tried pulling them open. The lacquered wood groaned with discomfort as the college student braced his feet and yanked the handles as hard as he could.

No dice. The door refused to budge even as veins of effort popped from Junpei's face. Junpei released the handles and the door rattled back into place. He noticed that an electronic bar with two colors, red and green, was bolted over the hinge frame of the door, the red light on.

"Locked…" he said pensively. That could only mean one thing; that June was right. They need to do something within this room if they were ever going to move on.

"Is it locked?" June called from the bottom of the stairs.

"Thing won't budge. I guess that means you're on to something, June!" Junpei called back, grinning encouragingly down at her.

"Could've figured that out, Watson." Santa grumbled to himself.

Junpei rejoined June and Santa. All three huddled around the record player.

June prompted the other two to say something. "So… this is all we've got."

"Play music… that's fantastic and all, but we don't even have a record to play," Santa said.

"…"

They straightened up and looked at each other at the same time. Then, wordlessly, they walked away and began searching the room for a black disk.

Only a minute passed before they found it.

"Look, look! Up there! " Junpei was doing jumping jacks, waving his arms around in the center of the dance floor.

"Jumpy, you found it? Where…" June followed Junpei's arm up the ceiling along with Santa.

Teasingly hanging from the bottom layer of the chandelier, was the record. It dangled calmly from a white rope knotted around the base, suspended at least thirty feet from the slick paneling of the floor.

"Awww, seriously man?" Santa whined at the ceiling, winging his arms in frustration. "We have to snag it from all the way up there? Godammit Zero!"

"Maybe we could try stacking chairs?" June suggested.

"What, no way! That's way too dangerous! We wouldn't even make it up halfway before the thing topples over!"

As Santa and June disputed back and forth at each other some more, Junpei descended his gaze from the chandelier south until it hit the dance floor. Something was up. He crouched under the mobile of lights and felt the wooden grooves of the floor.

His suspicion was right. Carved into the dance floor, smack dab underneath the chandelier, was an indented panel that was slightly deeper than the rest of the floor. Upon closer inspection, Junpei could see glittering marks of some sort radiating from inside the panel and outward to five more panels, organized in two rows of three panels. However, the marks were dimmed for some reason; Junpei couldn't read or make sense of them no matter how much changed angles.

The background noise of June and Santa's discussion dissipated and Junpei felt a shadow cast over his back.

"What are you looking at, Jumpy? Can I see?"

What were these designs? If only Junpei could read them, then maybe they would have another clue to their solution…

June leaned over further and her bun fluttered against Junpei's cheek, setting off a pang of heat under his collar.

"Wow, those markings… sparkle. The lines kind of glow in your shadow, Jumpy." Her voice penetrated Junpei's inner ear, smooth and delectable as honey. Junpei gulped and hoped that his face wasn't as hot as he thought it was.

Then, the brilliance of her comment smashed into him like an oncoming projectile.

"That's it!"

Junpei sprang up. "June, you're positively brilliant!" he cried and sprinted off into the throng of seating tables.

"I am?" June said, patting her cheek.

Junpei hadn't felt this excited since he got a puppy for Christmas! Planting his hand above the flicker of fire, Junpei poked his head over the bronze dish of one of the oil lamps. He puffed up his face and, with a quick whiff of air, blew out the candle. Junpei circled the room, blowing out the flames one by one.

"Wha-hey, what the hell Junpei, those are the only lights we have!" Santa yelled at Junpei incredulously, marching after him. He was about to restrain the college student with a custom hello from his fist when the floor began illuminating under his boots. The irate man halted to see his shirt and hair emit neon green.

"…h-huh, why're my clothes green?" Santa craned his head behind his shoulder, grabbing at his tank top. That was when he caught sight of the breathtaking spectacle flickering to life across the entire the dance floor.

Efficiently finishing off the very last lamp, Junpei turned to drink in his creation.

Patterns of speckled arrows swirled in flourishes around the dance floor. They connected and lead from oval-like representations in a meandering path of dubious linearity, flowing from one oval to the next along the entire expanse of the parquet wood. Junpei beamed proudly at his skills of deduction. It was just as he'd suspected. The record was an indicator; it was positioned above six indented panels with the numbers 1-6, panels surrounded by the markings that could only be seen in the dark. Now, their only source of light hung on the ceiling.

The chandelier.

June shuffled in dizzying circles, a bit disoriented by the darkness, gazing openly at the abstract indentations.

Santa backed up to the row of white tables, boots scuffing at the symbols. "Oh… I get it," he said.

June applauded Junpei. "Woohoo! Good job, Jumpy!"

"Thank you, thank you! You're all too kind! I'll be here all week!" Junpei boomed from the seating tables. He snapped his fingers and spun around into and open-armed bow, smirking boyishly under his bangs at June. The college student half-walked, half-did-a-jig back to his two companions.

Not amused, Santa impeded Junpei's trek to June, pushing at the air as if it was the college student himself. "Yeah, yeah, you're such an ace detective," he snarked, rolling his eyes. "Back to business. This hieroglyph stuff might be visible now, but its all a bunch'a gibberish. I don't have a clue what it means and neither do you," Santa said more venomously than normal, thinly veiled annoyance salivating under his tongue.

"You could at least give me some props for getting us farther along than we would've been screwing around trying to get that record," Junpei said bluntly.

Sadness tingled in June's conscious that Santa was so opposed to Junpei, but she yanked it back with a smile. "Now we have a more complete idea of how to solve the riddle, thanks to Jumpy," she said while giving Santa a scolding look. Santa, too busy quietly cursing at the chandelier and Junpei, couldn't tell the difference. June changed the subject to something more practical. "I wonder what these symbols on the floor mean…"

"Um… well, I'll get out of the way," Junpei bounded off the dance floor, "and let's take a look."

The trio pondered over the myriad of arrows and ovals. Relevant to their search, June, Junpei, and Santa had three things of importance. One, they had the record player, which could be used to play music. Two, of necessary value to the use of number one, was the record hanging from the chandelier. At the moment, they had no way of retrieving it, but it was obvious that they would require it sooner or later. Last of all, number three was the glowing marks displayed on the dance floor. They figured it would be wise to solve that problem before bothering with the record.

"Hmmmm… the arrows are easy enough. They're all pointing in a certain direction." Junpei traced them figuratively. "See? They lead around the whole dance floor in a giant circle. I doubt that that's just a random coincidence."

June considered the arrows thoughtfully. She was particularly interested in the ovals drawn in between them. Ovals and arrows…

"Ah-hah! I've got it! It's a map of the constellations. You see, over there is Orion," June slid her boot in a line over by the staircase, "Virgo—like me—" she indicated to a trapezoid of arrows near the center, "and then at the top is the big dipper!" she decided for herself. "I can't tell if the other constellations are on the map though, the rest of its all a mess…" June said with disappointment, hanging her head.

"…"

"What are you smoking, June? Constellations have nothing to do with old ballrooms. Does your mind live on the moon or something?" Junpei said like it was a blatant, albeit true, rhetorical question.

"Hey, that's mean! I was just throwing it out there!"

"Oh, um… by the way, you're a Virgo?" Junpei asked abruptly, inconspicuously hiding his inner delight.

"Jumpy, you should know that already! Or… did you forget my birthday after all these years?"

Junpei fiddled with his hair, steadily flushing a deeper tan as he desperately tried to remember what June's birthday was. August? September? Somewhere around there because she was a Virgo… A nervous laugh escaped from his throat and he tried to avoid June's hopeful stare.

"You did! You forgot my birthday!" June drilled her disappointment through Junpei's awkward blushing. "I can't believe you, Jumpy!"

Junpei waved his hands apologetically, afraid that June was mad at him. "Sorry, I'm sorry!" He awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck. "It sorta, just… you know-it slipped my mind. I mean," he pleaded up at her with the eyes of a wounded brown bear, "I haven't seen you in seven years or so. Is it that hard to assume I might've… forgotten some stuff in the time we were apart?" he begged cutely, jutting his lower lip at June.

June crossed her arms and 'hmphed', defiantly resisting her childhood friend's 'sad-boy-face' ploy. Junpei inched his pursing lip closer. June leaned away. He sidled up to her, pointing at his lip. June turned her back. He whimpered, brown eyes bobbling wetly. June's stubborn resolve flittered feebly at the college student's display. Her blue eyes slid back to him and she jerked them away. Junpei howled on all fours with an imaginary tail between his legs.

"Oh, fine!" June twisted around and threw her sleeves down. Junpei perked a smile and jumped to his feet. June sighed dramatically. "I_ forgive you_, Jumpy, for forgetting my birthday…" she drawled out like it was such a difficult task to muster for the college student.

"Yay!" Junpei grinned like a kid who had just gotten his way with his parents.

June couldn't help cracking a giggle. "My birthday is September 18th. You better remember it for _next time_, Jumpy."

Junpei's mind slowly plunged into the forbidden pit at what June meant by 'next time' when he heard a growl from behind them.

"God, I think I'm getting cavities over here watching you two simpering at each other. You lovebirds are practically suffocating me with all your cliché-" Santa mimicked Junpei's voice, "'Oh darling, I'm-so-sorry-I-forgot-your-birthday' bullshit. Makes me sick." He tossed a hasty glance at the ballroom entrance.

"I'm hungry," he said purposely to June and Junpei, flipping his hair into his face to hide the downturned flicker of his eyes, "I'm going to get a muffin."

With that, the silver man abandoned June and Junpei behind in a whoosh of tense emotions.

"…"

"Who shoved a pole up his ass?" said Junpei, quirking an eyebrow.

June pressed a finger to her mouth insistently. "Shhhhh, Jumpy! Be a little more considerate," June whispered harshly, though she did appear somewhat stung by Santa's callous words as well. "We did kind of ignore him and forget he was there."

"So what! That's no excuse to act like a prick when we were only fooling around. He's done nothing but complain since we came through the numbered door!" Junpei argued. He watched Santa from across the room as the other man broodingly rummaged through the plastic bag.

June watched Santa with Junpei, her features drooping sadly. "Don't say things like that, Jumpy. Santa… he may be a bit rough-ish and prickly around the edges, but, but… he's really a good person, I swear! He's probably just stressed out from the pressure of the game, so… let's let it go for now, okay? Please?" June wound her hands over her chest.

Junpei didn't understand June's logic at all. Her friend/roommate/maybe boyfriend, or whatever the hell he was, was a complete jackass! Junpei just didn't get it. "What're you defending him, June? He insulted you too! I'm not standing for it if he's gonna keep blowing his goddamn fuse and taking it out on us!' Junpei wanted to add 'especially not you', but restrained himself, "The guy's a freakin' time bomb with no self control!"

June held her ground. "Jumpy, stop worrying! _I said _forget it already!" June glared at him and bit her lip as if she wanted to say one more thing when Santa returned, an apple-cinnamon muffin poking out of the corner his mouth.

Oblivious to June and Junpei's heated conversation, the silver man tipped his head toward the dance floor.

"Ohm, bry ne wray," he took a bite from the muffin and held it in his hand, chewing, "while you two were busy makin' googly faces at each other, I figured out what those symbols on the dance floor are." His hair became bathed in a fluorescent glow as he walked over to one of the shapes next to the number 5 panel. "These oval things at the end of these arrows? I don't think they're really shapes at all." Santa chomped off another chunk of the muffin and—his mouth too full to finish—chewed with a deadpan expression and swallowed.

"They're footprints."

June parted her lips went over next to Santa. Junpei stayed behind, his thoughts tumultuous and, quite frankly, not interested at the moment. He was adamantly hell-bent against being anywhere near the white-haired man.

"Footprints? Really…" June folded her arms behind her back and crooked her neck at the ovals. "Ooh yeah, I see. These shapes have a bunch of little bumps on the border. It looks like the outline of a shoe now that you mention it."

Santa nodded and shoved the last crumbs of the muffin in his mouth, licking his fingers one-by-one. "Since there's also arrows pointing from one set of 'em to the other, it's probably telling us that we have follow them in the direction they point. But, what I don't get is why there's two sets of them facin' each other in every spot."

June noted that there were four footprints after every arrow, the left and right feet veered with its toes facing another set of prints. While Junpei stewed with steam leaking out of his ears behind her and Santa stared blankly at the wall, June attempted to give a reasonable explanation for the way the prints were arranged.

If there were four between each arrow, then that could mean the second set of prints were just an extra reminder of where to move. Possible… but the two sets of prints weren't parallel. They were aligned like two people face-to-face standing in front of each other. Two people… a dance floor…

June's light bulb turned on. "I know why! The reason there are four footprints is because they're showing that _two people_ need to be on the dance floor. Which means that this whole map…"

"…is a map of instructions showing us how to dance a duet in the ballroom," Junpei finished for June, skirting the tip of her sleeve as came up beside her. He felt frazzled as if a kettle had been set to boil inside his head. The kettle wasn't whistling yet, but it might start hissing if Junpei didn't cool down soon.

"Alright. Sounds good enough for me," Santa said agreeably. He regarded June and Junpei with purpose. "So, who wants to do it?"

"Do what?" June said.

"Dance, duh. It's either me and you or you and Junpei. There's no way in hell I'm dancin' with another guy," Santa remarked plainly, giving Junpei a dirty look like it would be particularly disgusting if it was the college student. Junpei glared back at Santa with mutual displeasure from the mere suggestion.

"Oh, okay. So me with one of you guys…"

Santa looked at June compliantly. "I'm not much for dancing, but if it's the only way to get out of here, I'll do it."

June smiled at Santa politely for the offer, but didn't accept it. Swaying back and forth on her toes as if she was fluctuating between two different scenarios, June stared at her feet, her face steadily glowing a bashful scarlet.

"Unless…" Santa took in June's reserved stance, flip-flopping from her to Junpei. "You'd rather dance with Junpei there."

Bull's-eye. June squeaked and unclasped her fingers, a crimson hue instantly blooming on her cheeks. "Uh! Um… n-n-no, of course not! I'd be perfectly happy dancing with either one of you!" she asserted, frantically shaking her arms around with clear embarrassment.

Both Santa and Junpei were dead unconvinced. Junpei blushed the same color as June and twitched a crooked half-smile at the prospect, diverting his eyes with similar bashfulness from the flustered girl. Santa gave June a 'that's-utter-bullshit-you-so-want-to' raised eyebrow, but curbed himself from saying anything to further drown her in embarrassment.

June continued to rapidly insist to the contrary. "That's t-totally not it! I'm serious! Jumpy and I don't need to be the ones dancing! We're… we're-" She scrunched up her face to blurt something out when Junpei stepped in to save her.

"Y-yeah, besides, I don't think we should be forcing a choice down June's throat when we haven't even gotten the record yet. We can't really dance if there's no music to help us set the rhythm," Junpei interjected blunderingly, trying to play up the practicality to a skeptical Santa, "-Plus, even though we know now what the symbols mean, we still haven't figured out what those numbered panels are meant to be used for. It's pretty clear that they're important too."

Reminded of the forgotten piece of the puzzle, Santa and June looked at the panels along with the flustered college student. That's right, there were still those six numbered panels under the chandelier. Despite their thorough examination of the ballroom, they hadn't yet discovered anything related to the panels' purpose.

"Uh-oh… you're right, Jumpy!" June gasped softly. "But, isn't it too late? You already blew out all the lights in the room. It'll be really hard to see if we're going to look around again." She squinted through the darkness at the electronic lock blaring red over the exit as if to emphasize her point.

Santa buried his hands in his pockets and lifted his shoulders. "Oh well, I guess. There's nothin' we can do about that. We'll just have to work off the light from the chandelier—it's not like we've got a choice at this point. We're gonna need that record."

Reluctant to abandon the progress they had come so far with from the beginning, the trio breathed three haggard sighs and set to exploring… again.

Junpei mulled over where he should go first when a new thought struck him. If they were looking for something in a room that functioned as a clue, then shouldn't that thing kind of stick out or be somewhat atypical for the place it was in? Come to think of it, the group hadn't really bothered looking around the rest of the ballroom after he'd extinguished all of the oil lamps. Was there something from before the room went dark? Something strange that one of them had found…

"_These tables are strange. They're all line up like they're supposed to be important, but there's nothing on them 'cept these flowers."_

"Flowers…"

Junpei wheeled around and returned to the buffet tables.

Once away from the chandelier, the darkness multiplied in hazy fumes around the college student's face; he could practically feel his pupils stretching to accommodate for the lack of light. Junpei plopped his palms on the buffet table and leveled himself with the vase holding the roses.

"This vase looks different from before…" Peering closer to the glass, Junpei looked through the water at the stems of the roses.

A dull luminescent blue illuminated the water surrounding the flowers. The glow was dim enough to go unnoticed at a distance; Junpei surmised that was why none of them had seen it before.

"Wait a minute… it's not coming from the water…"

The glow came from underneath the vase. Holding the blossoms of the roses gingerly with one hand, Junpei picked up the vase and set it aside.

Written in bold blue letters on the tablecloth, was a question.

"What is the time signature of a waltz?" Junpei read aloud, his face widening in a shade of fluorescent blue.

A waltz? That was a type of music. Easy enough.

But… what the hell was a time signature?

Junpei crumpled up his face. "How should I kno-"

"Jumpy, Santa, I found something!"

Junpei cut out mid-complaint and turned towards June's perky voice.

"On the pillar here, near the entrance, there's a little '3'!" June called out excitedly, her petite figure too enveloped in darkness for Junpei to make out.

"Really? Lemme' see." Junpei heard Santa's lower tone coming from the congregation of seating tables a fair distance away. Loud clops echoed from a pair of boots over to where June had called out.

"Oh yeah, you're right. There's a little '3' written at the bottom. I'm surprised we didn't see it before."

"Well, it's glowing blue like it was painted on with some kind of chemical. We couldn't see it when the room was light, so whatever it's painted on with must only show up in the dark. Plus it's written pretty small."

"'3' on the pillar over here… hey June, what about the other pillar? The one on the other side of the entrance?"

"The other pillar? Um, no… I haven't looked over there yet. Do you think there's something else written over there, Santa?"

"Maybe. I'm gonna take a look."

Walking curiously back to the chandelier, Junpei heard the shuffle of Santa's clothes as he moved away from June.

A jubilant grunt sounded from the entrance. "Aw, hellz yeah! There's a number on this one too! There's a '4' written at the bottom of this one," he confirmed.

"Do you see any numbers on the other pillars?"

"Nah, these two look like the only ones. There's nothin' else on the rest of the pillars."

Two pairs of boots scuffled around for a minute before returning back to the glimmering coating of the chandelier. His pupils finally dilated enough to see a fair distance, Junpei presented his own piece of information as June and Santa emerged from the shadows.

"So you guys found the numbers '3' and '4', huh?"

"Yup! Did you find anything Jumpy?"

"I sure did… _buuut_ it doesn't make two shits worth of sense." Junpei ran a hand through his hair Santa and June's confused reactions. "Under the flower pot on those tables was some writing the same color as the numbers you found."

He repeated the question he found. "'What is the time signature of a waltz?' That's what it said. Totally unfair of Zero if you ask me to be quizzing us on Trivial Pursuit at a time like this," Junpei said, upturning his palms.

Santa crinkled one eye, looking just as stumped by the question as Junpei. June, however, gave Junpei a bizarre tilt of her head and giggled at him into her hand.

"Silly Jumpy, that's an easy one! Anybody with basic knowledge of playing an instrument knows that."

Junpei flinched at how straightforward June thought it was and harrumphed, crossing his arms and turning away, lips puckered. Well, maybe _he_ wasn't 'most people with basic knowledge'! Junpei happened skip over the marching band in middle school!

…or maybe… he kinda-sorta-accidentally-bashed-the-conductor-over-the-head-with-his-clarinet-at-his-very-first-concert… maybe…

Junpei frowned gloomily.

"A time signature is the little notation at the beginning of a measure of music. It tells the person playing the instrument the number of beats in a measure and the value of each beat. Basically, it looks like two numbers, one on top of the other," June curled her thumb and pointer fingers to represent a number and held her right fingers above her left, "like this."

"How do you know this stuff June?" Junpei asked.

Two flecks of red pricked June's cheeks. "O-oh, um… I used to play the flute in high school."

"Damn straight, she did," Santa said casually.

He toyed with his scarf… then sucked in his next breath as if he realized something.

June let out a strangled 'eep' as Santa's eyes bulged and swiftly grabbed Junpei's arm, dragging him over to the center of the floor. "A-anyway, the time signature of most waltzes is '3' over '4', just like the numbers we found on the pillars! Since that's all the information we can find, then they must be the numbers of the panels we have to press! R-right, Jumpy, don't you think?" June blubbered out frantically, her plastered smile uneven.

Despite June's efforts, it was too late. Junpei caught Santa's comment, or rather, the underlying meaning of it. Santa knew June in high school? Or probably… he'd even known her before that? What the hell was going on, and why was June so fervent about hiding it?

Junpei felt distraught and a tad betrayed, but decided to keep his musings to himself. June had already plumped onto ground on her knees, searching for the correct panels. Junpei thought _escape room first, ask questions later_.

Santa regained his typical nonchalant stance and ambled over next to Junpei right as June pushed the '3' and '4'.

Immediately, the grating clang of a chain chafing against hardwood banged from the ceiling. Under the leverage of a winding crank, Junpei, June, and Santa looked up to see the chandelier chugging down from the ceiling, the record spinning from the vibrations.

The trio jumped out of the way, scared the glass might shatter from the intensity of the rattling chain. They closed back in once the chandelier exuded a puttering 'clunk'. It stopped about ten feet from the dance floor, the string tied to it swinging five feet lower.

One record, right in reach.

"Cha-ching! Awesome June!" Santa cheered and pumped his fist, moving to untwist the knot holding the black disk.

As Santa pulled the string apart, Junpei and June looked at the record player and shuffled their feet. Both shrunk into the dance floor.

"_C'mon_… frickin' knot …" Santa grumbled as he struggled with the loops. He yanked the centermost string and the ball unthreaded loosely. "Yes! I've got ya… knotty fucker!" The silver man swung the string away from the record, catching the black disk with his other hand.

He presented it to June and Junpei. "Record: jacked! Now all that's left for us…" Santa began energetically before catching the awkward atmosphere stagnating around his teammates. He lowered the record and slid a hand onto his hip.

"… don't tell me you guy's are wussin' out on me already."

June burst into a blush, mortified. "S-Santa! Who said that Jumpy was the one I wanted to dance with! Y-you… you just automatically assumed that I… th-that we…"

"June, cut the crap." Santa placed a firm foot on June's futile arguments. "May as well get it over with," he said complacently, silently egging Junpei to make a move, as much as Santa didn't want him to.

Junpei fidgeted with his vest. Slowly piling up his courage, the college student felt a drop of sweat trickle down his neck as he turned to June. The flustered girl scrambled her fingers nervously.

"U-uh… um…"

Junpei coughed and brandished his hand, offering it down to June. She tilted her head up.

Managing to wobble out a friendly smile, Junpei beckoned his hand. June, reading Junpei's smile carefully, blushed again and reached out. Grazing her dainty fingers against Junpei's rough palm, she closed them over his own.

"Good job, boys and girls," Santa said, turning toward the record player. "Now lets get the hell out of here."

He left the timid pair to stand like paralyzed statues and went over to the record player. Easing the black disk onto the turntable, the silver man messed around with the contraption to figure out how to turn it on before placing the needle between the vinyl grooves.

Meanwhile, June and Junpei felt the circulation cut off in their feet.

"Hope I did this right… I'm not even sure if this old piece of shit'll work," Santa mused to himself. He set the record to play.

With the smooth sound of a scraping disk, the record rotated to life, crackles emanating from the grooves. The record sizzled for a few seconds, before a lulling melody emerged through the disk.

June and Junpei blinked. The music pervaded their ears and they relaxed their hands, leaving them entwined.

"It's… a waltz," June said.

"…"

"How… unsurprising."

And indeed a waltz it was. Choruses of softly chiming notes wafted from the vinyl disk, strangely cheerful within the darkness. They swayed to and fro in curving mountains of amplitude, over and under in rising crescendos. Several peaks of collective accents rose out of the winding notes, celebrating the splendor of the complicated piece.

The trio listened intently to the waltz. Never pausing to discuss their next move, they stood rooted, enchanted by the soothing flow of the orchestral classic. They listened to it until the very end.

As soon as it came, the music faded back into the cozy storage of the black record. Santa shut off the player and brought his attention the interlinked hands of his two companions.

"Well, that was it. You've listened to in once, so that should be enough for you to be able to dance, right?"

"_The Blue Danube_…" June mumbled quietly.

"What was that?" Junpei asked June.

June jumped. "Oh! Nothing! It's just that I've heard this piece before… its actually quite famous…" She wrinkled her face down at the floor in confusion. "How did I…"

"Oh… cool," Junpei said. He coiled his fingers tighter around her hand and tugged her towards the starting arrow on the dance floor. "Okay Santa, play that thing again once I say go."

Santa gave him a sarcastic 'OK' sign with his hand and, without a word, set the record up to play again. Readying his stance, Junpei weaved the fingers of his right hand with June's left, trying to be a discreet as possible. This was no big deal! Not at all! It was only June… only Akane Kurashiki… oh who was he kidding…

Junpei folded his lips and fumbled with June's grip. June's fingers flexed and went rigid in erratic spurts as she attempted to hold Junpei's other limb. Eventually, through all the dodged looks and nervous mumblings, the pair managed to form a passable imitation of beginning dance position.

Both glanced away at the markings on the floor.

"Sheesh, you lovebirds ready yet? I don't have all day."

"Just shut up and go, Santa!" Junpei snapped. The other man complied and dropped the needle onto the record. He leaned his back against the buffet table and locked his arms over his chest like he was preparing himself for a long, drawn out session of mental sulking.

Music arose from the black disk once again. Junpei and June concentrated on their first set of footprints.

"…"

The pair strode up the starting arrow.

"Hey, Jumpy?"

"Yeah?"

"Why, um… why do you think we're here right now? Together? Playing this game?"

"Well… I dunno, that's a good question. I'm not really sure at this point, but… its kinda stretching it to call it 'that'. To call whatever this fucked up thing we've been thrown into… a game."

"What else am I supposed to call it?"

"Uh… well, from what we've seen so far, I guess it'd be safe to say that this is more of an experiment than a game."

"An 'experiment'? Wow that's a pretty in-depth conclusion for you Jumpy… u-uh, I mean, it's a bit complicated to think something like that already! I-I mean, we don't even know who Zero is. It's a little too soon to be making assumptions when we're only at the beginning of the race."

"…"

"…The beginning, you say? Yeah… I suppose you're right. It's only the first day. It is kinda impulsive of me to be making decisions beyond what we've found out so far. But… I can't help it. All these questions have been screaming at me inside my head ever since Zero's broadcast. I want to know… who the hell is he? Zero. Where are we? What 's the point of this twisted, fucked up test? And…" Junpei lost his words for a moment.

"And?"

"And… why did he bring us together again, after we'd been separated for nine years? N-not that I'm complaining, of course, but it begs so many questions."

"… perhaps it was fate?... n-no that's dumb … but the only other thing it could be is that we were brought together by coincidence."

"Yeah… right. Those are probably the only two options."

"A-anyway, I don't think that's what's the most important right now. What's important is that you, me, and Santa stick together. To figure this game out…"

"Guess so…"

"I wish I could help you, Jumpy. I wish I had the answers too, but… I don't.

"…"

"Zero… that bastard! Laughing away at us from his lair… why?"

"…"

"…"

"Jumpy?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm scared."

"…"

"…"

"Me too, June. Me too."

Disappearing into the hazy cover of the shadows, the music stopped.

Confident with surprisingly skillful progress along the symbolic instructions, June and Junpei finished their waltz in a spinning flourish, ending on the last set of footprints. Junpei would've dipped June in the sling of his arm if her were in a more lighthearted mood, but at the moment, the ancient air of the ballroom constricted the muscles around his throat. He felt stifled, his eyes glazed over with a fleeting, melancholy hopelessness. June was the same.

Santa clapped his hands, his expression rough like he had been thinking way too hard about something.

"Bravo, fledglings! I heard some sorta' beep come from the door over on the balcony, " he said while strolling up to meet the weary couple. "The light's green now, so I think that means we can move on. Thank God… I was beginning to catch a cold from all the dust and shit floatin' around in this place. Ready?" Santa inclined his head toward the staircase. June and Junpei remained silent.

"…"

"You two are quiet all of a sudden. Somethin' happen?"

Junpei shook his head to shake away the worries plaguing his mind. June softly breathed in at Santa.

"No, nothing… let's go."

Santa watched the weakness in her voice warily. "…If you say so."

Burdened by the weight of the passing hours, the trio steeled their resolve continued deeper into confines of the number five door.


	4. Chapter 4

Waaaah! Apologies for the month long update! Senior year is a busy time . The next chapter won't be up for a while too, since I'm not even in the country these next two weeks.

**To the reviewers:**

**rain:** One of the things that really struck a sense of attachment into my heart about 999 was by far the distinctive voice of the characters. No two characters speak with the same tone or inflection. Junpei talks to himself and makes lots of dorky jokes, June speaks cheerily and very tactful of others feelings, Santa curses all the time (in fact, he's the easiest to write for just because of that :P), Clover talks inarticulately (she uses 'thing', 'stuff', and 'thingy' a lot to describe stuff), Snake is regal and refined, Lotus is prissy yet bluntly intelligent in how she words things, Seven is rough but precise with what he is talking about, and Ace uses formal, overly serious language. Thanks for bringing that up!

**Naridar:** Oh-ho, you caught me! Good thing too, because I added June's birthday kind of last minute. Shame on my geeky obsession with astrology! I should have known! Anyway, thanks for pointing that out (plot holes always split noticeable chasms in fanfics). At the time I was trying to go by memory (and failed). By the way, regarding the early tension, it surprised me when I was playing 999 that Santa and Junpei didn't butt heads more (at least over June). Their personalities seemed so much like the type to clash, but it never really happened. _So, _I decided to exploit it XD.

**Niamy Tak:** Clover is quite the cutie, with her princess beds and platonic princes :D. I love her relationships with Snake in particular, because it's so odd. I mean, Snake is obviously a hardened intellectual bordering on a genius and Clover is… well, let's just say she's not XD. Yet, they get along so well and are close enough for Clover to go axe crazy over his death O_o. They are certainly not your ordinary brother-sister pair.

**Draconic:** Wow, long review. LOVE those! Oh, and also you read my mind to a T in the last part of your review. Originally, I _was_ going to make it 81 people because of all the things you mentioned (I don't mean to snub!). However, I later decided against it because, in this game, 10 serves as an arch number as well as 9. The reason why won't be revealed until much later on, but that was why I incorporated the 10 day time limit and the 9 x 10 player rule. Thanks for all the feedback!

**DUN, DUN, DUN TRIVIA!:**

What are the three opposing players from chapter 2 named for? (Hint: Lucky and Lulu are obvious, but Liam is not XD)

Why was Junpei so excited to find out that June was of the Virgo astrological symbol? (Bonus: Which of the four elements is Virgo?)

The first puzzle room of door number 5 is a ballroom. Why this particular theme? (Hint: Think back to the puzzle rooms of the original game and the doors they were located in)

**Disclaimer:** I do not own _9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors_. It belongs to Aksys Games and the vault of epicness.

**Warning:** Semi-important OC in this chapter! Normally, I never insert OC's into any kind of fanfiction because they disturb the atmosphere of the entire story, but in the case of this sort of plot, it's absolutely necessary. I promise they won't steal the spotlight from the main characters—their role is purely supporting. I have thought out the personality and voice of every OC, so I hope they will be as enjoyable as the regular characters. Suggestions are highly welcome in this regard!

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By the hour Clover and Light had managed to exit their room, the morning sun had begun to fade behind the silhouette Zero's city.

A quiet rush of air whisked hurriedly through the trees, rustling Clover's hair out and unhanding it back into place. She tucked her hands behind her back and remained tranquil as the sudden breeze left the district.

"Wow…" she said.

Before her and her brother, just outside the _Quanternary Inn_, a name that they had read off the silver plaque on the front registration desk, was a central park. Plots of well-maintained trees displayed their leaves pertly in shades of green and yellow. Among them, freshly mowed grass and small batches of local wildflowers mingled cheerfully together in clumped bursts of color. On the far side of the park, the side opposite to Clover and Light, was a semicircular cobblestone bridge with a clear, freshwater river tricking underneath it. Clover was stationed on the south walkway lined with benches, close enough to hear the bubbling overflow of the grand marble fountain decorating the center of the park, but too far away to make out the rumble of the river.

Light came up behind her, his footsteps lightly skimming the cement. "Clover, where are we?"

"We're in some kind of public park place. You know, like "Central Park" in New York City? It looks just like that one."

Light looked up at the sky and inhaled the noontime scent of vegetation. "I somewhat assumed as much. The air here smells many times cleaner than the air inside the inn. Though, I do have to wonder how there could possibly be a running freshwater stream in the middle of an empty city," he said with shadowed distaste, adjusting his jacket.

Clover nodded ahead. "It's actually pretty nice to look at. I almost wanna take a dip in the river to wash off these smelly old clothes." She dug her fists into her hips and pouted. "Honestly, Zero has no idea how to treat a lady! I'm stuck here with only one set of clothes that are already all gross and sweaty from sleeping in them and Zero didn't even have the courtesy to pack me a bathing suit!"

_The nerve_, Light thought while sliding his eyes to the side.

"Stupid Zero! Stupid Urban Game! What did me and my brother do to deserve this!" she continued to rant into the trees, disturbing a flock of pigeons perched on the water fountain. "Arrrrrggggh!" The pink-haired girl scuffed her boot on the sidewalk, frightening a beady-eyed pigeon to flutter onto the central statue's head.

"My brother and I, Clover," Light corrected calmly.

She grumbled a few more complaints and pouted again. "Oh, whatever!" Anger swirled around her head as her face puffed up like boil and she straightened back up. She stared glumly ahead for a minute or two before a twinkle sparkled in her eye. "Well, at least the scenery is pretty. Zero does have good taste in gardening stuff—I'll give him that."

Sighing, Light stood opposite the gurgle of the fountain. "I suppose. Beautiful as it may be, it's the work of a presumed kidnapper, who might even be considered a murderer at this point if we take the implications of his little speech into account. It's quite ironic, this garden of prosperity. It's almost as if Zero is mocking us. Thoroughly… and with spite."

Normally Clover would have chided him for being such a spoiled sport, but Light's words rang painfully true. Seeing a demonstration of natural beauty so whimsical and carefree as a central park, the more she thought about it, was a million times worse than stumbling upon a fly infested mound of sewage. After considering what her brother said, the wild flowers she had deigned at first to be beautiful suddenly looked… _off_, like they were intruding upon territory they weren't supposed to be in. Another flush of wind stirred the flowers and they sauntered back and forth as if they were laughing at her. The trees were all motionless; before she could stop herself, Clover imagined blood crawling out of every pore of the hardwood until it was absorbed into the soil, devoured by tapeworms and maggots writhing in a frenzied battle over the remains.

That mask. That fucking gas mask. She could feel it breathing down the nape of her neck in the reflection of every cobblestone.

Clover burped grotesquely and cupped her mouth. She wanted to let it all out of her system right at that moment. However, much to her displeasure, the bile was replaced with tears threatening to burst from her eyes.

No! She couldn't cry now! Clover had to be strong. She could take this stupid exam! The bombs. The numbers. The doors. She could do it… she could totally do it!

But… could she do it and _live_ with her brother alive beside her, never mind herself?

Clover sniffed and wiped at her nose. She used all her willpower to hold back the lump in her gut. She was about to cover it up with a helpful suggestion to Light when the older man intervened.

As Clover coughed on the salt accumulating in her throat, two thin, bony arms embraced from behind. She felt like a quilt had been draped around her shoulders. "Steady Clover, easy. We'll make it out of here, okay? Mark my words; if it means we have to climb a skyscraper and dive over the barrier headfirst, we'll do it. Just please… don't worry. I beg you." He stroked his artistic fingers along the length of her arm, a gesture half brotherly, half paternal. "I can always sense when you worry because you lose that glow you always carry around with you. It goes out like a torchlight the moment you second guess yourself," he said truthfully.

Clover merely leaned into his arms, sniffling in between awkward hiccups. Light continued on, confident but still unsteady at his sister's lack of a reaction.

"So please… ignite that glow for everyone to see. For me to see. With your brilliant shine, anything is possible—barring breaking the laws of physics," he said, his face serious but tender.

Clover snorted and caught herself. The tears receded before she even realized they were gone. Light always paraded around with his intellectual façade; she didn't know how he could've said that with a straight face.

"*Sniff* Teehee, you're such a cheeseball Light!" Clover turned around and grinned cutely at him, poking him in the stomach.

A smile automatically yanked at his lip even though he couldn't see his sister's face. He stubbornly tugged it into a frown and turned away, folding his arms. "I do believe my speech was rather touching. _You_ simply have no taste."

Clover grinned wider at him and bounced off the ground with energy she didn't know she had. "Well, like you said! Let's go! I was getting sick of how fugly this place is anyway!" she said, grabbing his sleeve and twirling her skirt around to skip in the direction of the bridge.

She halted in her tracks, nearly tripping over her own feet.

"Hey, over here! Sup!"

On the bridge, were four other players.

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"Just a small town girl! Livin' in a lonely woooorld! She took the midnight train goin' anyyyywheeeeeeeeeeerePLEUGH! Blechugh… aw god, ugh…"

Wheezing on a discarded chunk of starch, Seven hocked up the interfering slab of waste and spat it in the gutter alongside the sidewalk. Eyelids dipping with annoyed countenance, he looked up woozily and glared at the fried corn dog in his fist.

"That's the last time I try to sing with my mouth full… thing tastes nasty after it's been lingering around in your mouth for more n' a few minutes," the large man remarked out loud, moving in for another bite despite his irritation, "it's like oatmeal-y paste… or something," he trailed on while tearing a baseball sized morsel out of the poor hot-dog on a stick.

Seven was strolling along a colorfully expressive boulevard. Generic shops with signs proclaiming 'Local Merchandise!' and 'A gift to bring back home for the whole family!" littered the entire block of this particular district, cluttered over heaps of cheap, one-liner t-shirts. _A Wayferers wet dream, _as Seven would always say. Every once in a while, a fast-food kiosk would pop up on the street corner with food still sizzling on the griddle, conveniently ignoring that the fact that there was no one to watch it before it burned. It felt more like a ghost manned the station and was simply neglecting its job rather than the kiosk having been abandoned before the games even began.

Not that long ago, Seven had come upon one of these strange carts after catching a whiff of what he _thought_ at the time was burning flesh. Seven had freaked out and went wheeling around the corner, only to find out the smell was a by-product of an entire sheet of charred hamburgers. Waving away the smoke in a panic with his enormous hands, Seven had immediately shut off the gas valve, wondering what kind of idiot flings meat on the grill and doesn't even have the decency to eat it. He chucked out the hamburgers, since they were nothing more than flaky hockey pucks at that point, but he did end up helping himself to a… nostalgic treat.

Chewing absentmindedly on his prize, Seven began to hum his song rather than sing it out loud.

"Hm-hmm-homm, mm-hmm-hnn-HNN-HMMMM!" He savored the greasy taste of the corn dog, old memories settling into the back of his mind as he passed into the next block.

Back when Seven was a wee lad—and by 'wee' he meant the size of a pickup truck as opposed to an omnibus—he would visit the local carnival with his friends every summer break. They used to buy the all day package bracelet, which would let them go on the rides as many times as they wanted until the sun set low in the sky. Back then, Seven was quite the daredevil; he whooped and shouted at the peak of the roller coaster, threw his arms in the air on the 'Tower of Fear', and was always the first to push his way to the front of the line, using his size and people's natural fear of his intimidating face to his advantage. Those were the good old days; trading baseball cards and splurging on pinwheel hats and fast food… he could remember it clear as a spiders woven web. Sadly though, he was getting too old and serious to appreciate those things anymore. Growing up kind of sucked the magic out of you after your first ten years in the real world.

"It's funny. I can remember gorgin' on these corn dogs with my buddies like it was day away, but I can't even remember how I got here in the first place!" Seven mulled over as he rotated the half eaten meat around between his fingers.

Reminiscing in childhood pastimes took no more effort than the flip of a coin, yet remembering how he woke up in that room was, to be blunt, _friggin' impossible_. No matter how hard he thought, smashed his head against the wall, and suffered through the relentless migraines, he conjured up nothing but faceless images. Seven had gambled that after some time passed and he got a little fresh air his memory would return, but so far, his mind was failing him. Since this had only been going on for an hour or two, Seven figured he was suffering from some form of short-term memory loss.

It was a genius ironic paradox. Seven was trying to remember what happened before he was captured, and what happened when he was captured was what caused the memory loss in the first place.

"A trickster, aren't you Zero? You _like_ fucking around with the police that are supposed to arrest you, eh? Clever all right…" the mountain of a man said pleasantly with the assumption that Zero was peeking at him through a hidden surveillance camera. "Clever indeed…"

Sucking on the last stub of corn dog clinging to the stick, Seven lumbered under the sturdy archway of a large marble building. A single file line of fifteen-foot columns rose up on his left.

"What's this place? It looks weird next to all them tourist shops." Seven flicked the bare-bone stick of the corn dog through one of the gaps.

"…"

"One column… " Seven said with a the simple motive of unconcealed boredom as he walked by each pillar.

"Two column…" It was like a family road trip down the countryside, one where you had nothing better to do than watch trees pass by.

"Three column… door… four column… five column… wait, door?" Seven reiterated, stopping in his tracks. He tottered back around, hat sliding over his ears, and returned to the sight of the goose in the duck pile.

Scarred face wrinkling up, two calloused hands were placed on a pair of yellow overalls as Seven paused to stand in front of the anomaly he almost missed.

"It's double sided…" Seven observed with a slight hint of actually caring, pulling his beanie further down his neck so it would stop sagging into his eyes. He remained placated as he fished for the tag that was sticking out to tuck it in.

"Dun-na-na-na-naaa…" the broad man hummed with only mild interest towards the door. "Tch, can't get it… thing's too big for my head," he muttered. The one-man mountain fumbled some more and managed to snag the uncooperative accessory.

"Got it!" He hooked it with his index finger. "Shadows, dancin'… duhnuh-de-de…" Seven twisted the beanie off of his forehead. Finally, he could see more than the goddamn cracks in the sidewalk!

"…nn-nuh-somewhere in the—_mm?_"

Seven reflexively crunched his hat into a wad.

There, right in front of his very own eyes, slick and waiting with the flushed, red mark of ultimate uncertainty, was a number '4'.

"_Good_ _mother of ironing loose laundry…_"

Seven stepped closer, stumbling, and compressed the beanie even tighter beneath his fingers. The number was painted across both sides of the double door entrance, sliced down the middle by the border fill separating the two doors.

He blinked once. Twice.

"A numbered door. I've… I've done it. I've found the number four door! It's here… of all places," Seven spoke in a hushed tone, reaching wide-eyed to place his beanie back on his head. "This morning has just been chock full of petty little surprises…"

"…but at least this one won't blow me into a buncha' blood and guts!" The huge man slowly curled his mouth into a smile, pumping his fist in a kid-ish cheer of energy. He leapt up, sending a shockwave through the ground, and rushed over to examine the levered panel next to the door.

"This thing must be the RED," Seven said, brushing his hand up against the backlit screen. "'VACANT'… like a hotel? That's gotta mean no one's in there right now. I wonder…" Seven scratched his chin, thinking carefully about his next move.

Lifting his left hand out, palm flat, the giant grazed the circular panel with the pads of his fingers, hesitating, before he pressed his entire hand on the panel. A beep sounded from the odd appendage.

Seven took his hand away. "The thing beeped, so… it must've reacted somehow to either my hand or the bracelet. I guess that red asterisk symbol is how it's supposed to confirm it," he gambled to believe, wrapping his right hand over the lever.

"How the hell does this thing work? It's a lever, right? So I probably just gotta pull it…"

A little afraid of what might happen to him after he tested out his theory, Seven backed away over to the wall with his hand still securely fastened around the lever. Once he felt a penny's worth more safe, the seasoned cop ventured to pull it.

The RED beeped cynically and the asterisk disappeared.

Aware that his hand was sweating enough to stick to the lukewarm metal, Seven peeled it away. "Well… I kinda expected that, even if my number was four, but at least now I know for sure it doesn't do anything with only one person," he said like it was reason enough to say his little experimentation wasn't an absolute waste of time.

He looked at the door again. "I guess it's be pretty fruitless to bother sticking around if I can't open it with only myself. I gotta go look for at least two more players if I'm ever gonna get a reaction out of this thing." Seven was slightly at a loss. He continued to look at the door, contemplating, and scratched his hairline. "Man… it's in such a plain view. If I leave now and fudge around lookin' for more players, somebody else is gonna walk by and snag it for sure! I've gotta find a way to hide it somehow…"

Hide… hide… Seven searched around from the front entrance, both for a solution to his problem and rogue players out on the prowl. He returned to the tourist block, shooting nervous looks over his shoulder the entire way. The first store he came upon was a discontinued art gallery.

The first thing Seven spotted as he walked up to the gallery was the pile of junk dumped next to the entrance ramp. "What's that stuff by the door? Somebody having a garage sale?"

Seven bent over the pile. "Let's see… there's a buncha' paintings, some clay pots, broken glass… _shit_, some of these canvases are huge." He retrieved a random painting of a sailboat from under some shattered vases and held it up to look at it.

He cocked his head to both sides as he critiqued the painting. "Jeez… I might know nothing about fancy modern art stuff, but even I can say this is pretty shitty, even by my standards. The clouds are shaped like fuckin' triangles!"

Seven chucked the canvas over his head and it smashed into the umbrella poking out of the kiosk on the corner. Bending over again to continue searching, he overturned the rest of the paintings with his toe and dragged out the billboard-sized slab of wood that was hiding underneath them.

Holding it up to chest level, the cop scanned the sign up and down.

"…"

He smirked.

"Perfect."

A couple minutes later, Seven whistled down the boulevard, the image of the pristine building looming in the background.

Posted over the double doors was a sign.

On the sign, it said, "_Historical_ _Union of Scientology_".

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Clover tipped over backwards and nearly landed on her butt, padded by the cushion of her brother's chest. Light pressed his hands on her shoulders, squeezing his closed eyes together.

The boy that yelled to them used his elbow as leverage to swing himself over the bridge. "Oh sorry! Did I scare ya?" he called to them as he ran up to meet the pair, his three companions following suit not far behind.

Clover and Light edged themselves away as the boy came closer. Clover was still shaken by the player's sudden appearance and Light, remembering the words of Zero's broadcast, was on guard to grab Clover if they tried anything.

"Aw, c'mon now! Don't run away! I'm not that ugly, am I?" the boy said and frowned, skidding to a stop about twelve feet away from Light and Clover. He seemed to respect their decision to keep at a distance, probably getting a tip off from the way Clover was gawking at him. The other three players jogged up to join him, and now the siblings could tell that the group consisted of two guys and two girls.

On the edge of their toes, Light and Clover stopped with a good, safe twenty feet between them and the other players. So far, the players, or at least the boy that greeted them, seemed friendly enough, but Light and Clover knew that they could change their tune the moment the siblings turned away, especially under the current circumstances.

"_I see_, so that's how it's gonna be! Well, can't say I blame ya," the talkative boy exclaimed at Light and Clover's unwillingness to leave themselves vulnerable. "The stakes are rough in this here city!" he said, folding his arms behind his head. Light and Clover didn't answer.

"…"

The pair and quartet watched each other from across the park.

From this fair distance, Clover was able to get a good analysis of the other player's features.

The boy at the forefront, the one that seemed to be the leader of their group, was the first that Clover brought her attention to. Something was… _different_ about him; the way that he had this perpetual wonky smirk on his face kind of freaked Clover out. She almost wanted to scrub it away with a bar of anti-bacterial soap; it was that creepy. Other than that… _smile_, though, there wasn't much else to note. He had a dark sandpaper tan and wore a simple white t-shirt with khaki shorts and red basketball sneakers. Though it was tough to tell from this distance, Clover also could estimate that the boy was similar in height to her brother, but more toned in build.

Behind 'sandpaper boy' was a girl that looked to be Clover's age, just out of fresh recruitment into adulthood. However, comparing the two girls to one another was like comparing a raven to a flamingo; the other girl had a tidal wave of rainwater blue hair cut short with one bang curtaining her left eye. A metric ton of eyeliner was slathered on her face in ringlets, causing her to resemble a sickly raccoon. She looked like the work of a factory rather than a biologically born human being with the way piercings and tattoos were applied without restraint to every cranny of her body, topped off with a black, tattered jean jacket. Clover wondered how much those lace-up boots of hers cost. She _totally_ wanted a pair. Anyway, Clover decided to dub the girl 'Anti-Clover'.

Distinctly more mature-looking than the rest of the pack, the second girl, more appropriately a woman from her daunting physique, appeared to be mentally categorizing Clover and Light from under the guise of her cozy knit beret. She gave the most interest to Clover's brother's unmoving face, her perfectly primped lashes dining on Light's closed ones. Clover couldn't help but feel a little jealous at how exquisitely curvy and filled out the woman was, even if she was kind of big boned. Her blonde hair tumbled over her shoulders in swirls akin to a model on the runway; she never once lost her imposing posture as she plumped her rosebud lips at the two siblings. She flaunted an icy pink sleeveless turtleneck over a pair of black leggings.

Last of all, shielding his scrawny body behind the wall of the other three players, was a short boy too tucked away for Clover to get a good look at. Every once in a while he would lean out from behind his safety zone, only to snatch himself back with apparent fear the second Clover turned her attention to him.

As if the silence was an insult to his outgoing demeanor, 'sandpaper boy' stuck out his tongue and took a casual stride toward Light and Clover. "Nyeah… this is so _booooring_. Hey cutie-pie, what's your name?"

Since the boy was obviously addressing her, Clover shrugged her brother's hands off her shoulders. Light flinched like he didn't want to let her go, but Clover didn't respond to the foreign player regardless, her knees in the first phase of buckling underneath her.

Light towered over her protectively. "That's none of your concern. State your names first and we might be more inclined to state our own," he answered before Clover could say anything.

'Sandpaper' cranked out a yawn at Light and stretched his tendons. "Dude, no need to be so formal. Yer makin' it sound like I'm proposing to marry her," he complained. "Well, if your gonna be so 1930s about it…"

"The name's Uno." He jerked his thumb at his chest. "_Numero_ Uno." Following up his declaration, he gave Clover another grin, slicking his tongue along his bright white teeth. His bracelet proudly displayed a '1' over his t-shirt.

The two girls behind Uno moved in cautiously. He jabbed the blue-haired one on the right to get her to speak first. 'Anti-Clover' bored her gaze drearily ahead and didn't bother to react to the gesture. Clover saw that her number was '8'. "I am… Paisley. The pleasure is not mine." Paisley stared through Clover as if she were a cardboard standee about to tip over.

"—And this here is Angel-chan!" Uno swiftly interrupted, snaking an arm around the blonde in question. She stumbled over uncharacteristically. "Ain't she purdy? You better watch out though, Princely, cuz she's mine! No touching the goods!" The energetic boy hooted in Light's direction. The flushing blonde twitched and smacked him over the head, her stoically pretty face suddenly marred by a matching set of embarrassed burn marks. Clover finally caught a glimpse of the girl's number. It was a '3'.

"Owwwweeee… gawd Angel-chan, no need to be so touchy! I just got that brain yesterday…" he yowled out, exaggerating his cringe of pain as he poked the offending place on his head.

"Just keep your fat mouth shut Uno! No one wants to listen to someone as retarded as you flap your jaw around!" Angel snarled out through her lips, though her face remained flushed as a candy-cane. She 'hmphed' and hugged her shoulders closer to her collarbone as if Uno had spread his germs on her, leering down at him.

Uno mock sniffled and looked like he was about to cry. "Awwwww, _Angel-chan_… but _I_ thought you loved me. Did our past hour of star-crossed love at first sight mean nothing to you?"

Clover and Light vegetated with their minds elsewhere. Light tried to analyze what everyone was saying to find and decode the secret meaning that _needed_ to lay under these antics. Clover just looked, her expression locked somewhere between the halfway point of 'pretending to be amused' and 'I need to go to the bathroom'.

Face planting in the ground with his butt in the air from the blow of Angel's fist, Uno went on with pitying his own misery until his eyes suddenly shot open. Like he'd completely forgotten the last few minutes of his pathetic life, he quirked his neck around and hopped to his heels. "Huh? Oh yeah, Simon hasn't made his introduction yet." He curled his hands around his mouth in a megaphone shape. "Yoohoo! Simon! Come on out munchkin-in-training!"

The cowardly boy from before snapped his spine back at the noise loud enough for Clover to hear the sickening 'crack' and made his way out from behind Angel, Paisley, and Uno. He fiddled with his glasses, taking them off and wiping a splotch of fog off the lens. Using the clumsy habit in place some sort of security blanket, he wiggled the glasses back on and spoke.

"I-I'm uh… Simon. Nice to meet you," he said and opened his lips again as if he felt he should say something else when Uno leaped in front of him, boisterously waggling his hands. Uno had jumped right before Clover could read Simon's number.

"There, that good enough for ya? We've answered your questions, so now it's time for you to answer ours!" Hinting with his off-putting grin for Simon to keep quiet for now, Uno cleared five feet of the gap closer to the siblings.

Clover finally found her voice, softly blurting out, "I'm Clover. Nice to meet you too." She beamed Simon and the others a nice smile.

"Whewee! So the cutie's name is Clover, eh? Looks like you might have some competition Angel-chan!" Uno whistled, oblivious to the veins of shivering fury popping from the voluptuous blonde's brow. He flopped his attention over to Light. "Alright, the lady has gone first. It's your turn now Princely. Don't get rude on us."

"…"

Light was already quite sure he wasn't very fond of this Uno boy.

"Ah, yes. It is due time for my introduction. My name is… Snake. A pleasure to have your acquaintance."

He adjusted his tie, smiling cordially at the expectant boy.

Uno turned his eyebrow. "Snake? What the hell kind of name is that? Oh well, I guess it _is_ sorta badass sounding. In a way." He shrugged and followed the lead of his terminally short attention span. "So now that all of that shit is out of the barrel, what brings you guys to this side of town?"

Clover looked to her brother, attempting to read what he was thinking after trying to rationalize what he'd just said. Snake remained tight-lipped; his closed eyes furrowed into his cheeks like he was calculating a riddle, prompting Clover to handle this one on her own.

The pink-haired girl answered Uno with her basic amiable attitude. "The hotel room we woke up in happened to be back there right next to the park. We actually didn't get very far away before you guys showed up," she said, instinctually holding both hands behind her back as she approached Uno, bracelet shoved under her sweater. She tried get another peek at Simon but was distracted by Uno's reply.

"Nearby, you say? Lucky… all of us got stuck in the middle of the goddamn petting zoo. At least, I _believe_ that's what it was. There were plenty of cages, but none of them actually had any animals in 'em. Only dung and alfalfa pellets," he said.

Clover found Uno's claim to be a bit strange. A _petting zoo_? What use would Zero have for a petting zoo? Unless… Zero had a soft spot for cuddly woodland creatures. It would certainly explain his blatant dislike of human beings.

"—We teamed up there and decided to go see what a bunch of trees were doin' in the middle of a city." He pointed behind him. "If you look at this place from there, it almost looked like the leaves were growing directly out of the pavement."

"Uno, what're you talking about? We came here to secure supplies," Paisley deadpanned next to him, her eyes succumbing Clover to uncomfortable levels of focus.

"Shush Paisley, I was getting to that!" he retorted in frustration, glaring at the emotionless girl then grinning at Clover. "Since it's getting farther into the afternoon, we're looking for food to gather up for tomorrow before the other players snatch it all up. Zero strikes me as stingy kind of guy, if you know what I mean?" he explained. He was almost close enough for Clover to hear him breathing in and out like he was salivating on the taste of the oxygen. Paisley, Angel, and Simon followed and Clover felt the static of her brother's presence behind her, winding her up into a tensely packed spring.

Despite that, Clover didn't know why she'd been so guarded before. These players seemed harmless enough.

Uno babbled on and on about various grudges he had to pick with their infamous game master, eventually culminating with, "—and we _never_ expected to find more people so soon, so it was really surprising to find you two wandering around here all _alone_…"

Clover was suddenly held back by a white-knuckled grip on her jacket. She saw the face of Simon's bracelet.

"…But let's cut to the chase."

Uno's eyes flattened into cold, demanding slits.

"What're your bracelet numbers?"

The order processed through Clover's mind without any initial recognition, trickling through her system in liquid crystal waves until she became numb. Numb with the realization of the present horror of her very existence.

On Simon's bracelet, was the number '4'.

"The man's number is '2' Uno," Angel barked, the confirmation a sharp enough pitch that Clover twitched and leaped back into her brother.

Uno punched his twisted smile right through Clover, settling onto Snake. "Oh really? You've been holding out on us Princely. Do tell that you'll make our competition proud," he slathered out in icy jabs that stabbed deeper into the hapless pair of siblings with every word.

Outstretching an arm like his greatest pleasure, barring nothing else, would be to shake hands with the fiercely scowling man that was Snake, Uno looked at the scholar with undeniable predetermination in his decision.

"Hehehe… welcome to the team."

Clover wasn't sure at first how she figured it out so quickly. Perhaps it was the way Angel, Paisley, and Uno became surrounded by a wicked haze of deceit, their eyes infected by the reality that their actions were completely of their own free will. Or maybe it was the single, glistening drop of sweat that tingled down the small of her back. One way or another, Clover was more sure of this one truth than she had ever been sure of any lie in her short, soon-to-be-deceased lifespan.

They weren't going to take _no_ for an answer.

Snake immediately responded to Uno's offer, anger apparent in the way he thrust down his open hand. "How crudely presumptuous can you possibly get! What makes you think that we have any obligation to blindly follow an offer from a stranger! I refu-"

"N-no…" Clover mumbled.

Snake choked back his last denial and looked to Clover.

Paisley's attention flashed over to the gradually shriveling girl backing herself away from her fate. "What was that? Speak up princess, I'm curious to know what you have to say about this. For a girl as… "peppy-looking" as yourself, you've been rather _quiet_ during this whole exchange."

Simon tried to cut in. "U-um guys, maybe we should be a little more tact-"

Uno leaned his neck lazily in Paisley's direction. "Oh yeah, you've got an _excellent _point there," he agreed dryly, drooping his head back to its original position. "Indulge us with your number too, cutie-pie. We'd _love_ to know. _Come on_," he coaxed like he was beckoning a frightened kitten, "there's no reason to be afraid."

Clover's counter remark failed her at the second attack of Uno's weasel-toothed grin.

Before Snake's reflexes could kick in for him to get Clover behind him, Paisley's arm shot out and seized Clover by the roots of her hair.

"If she's not gonna bother to tell us the nice way, then lets have a look, shall we?"

Paisely jerked Clover forward and a rending blast of pain slammed through Clover's scalp with the force of a thousand pinching needles. Clover's hands automatically flashed over her earmuffs and she let out a startled shriek. Tears of pain sprang from her eyes and the pink-haired girl's teeth crunched together as a hushed gasp escaped from Paisley's throat.

"H-huh, Paisley! What are you-" Simon stuttered out in disbelief a what just happened.

"Sh-she's a copy! Th-the girl… she's a '4'!" the goth babbled in a astonishment at her friends, who collectively gasped too once they saw the number on Clover's trembling wrist. Her nails curled harder into the sensitive skin of Clover's follicles and Clover could do nothing more than whimper.

"Clover!"

Clover's silent cries for help stirred the deepest dwelling beast in Snake to uncoil from its burrow. With a flying strike of an enraged assassin, Snake lashed out, smacked Paisely's limb away, grabbed Clover around her waist, and thrust her behind him. He knew that there was no more time to dabble in false pretenses; these games were serious.

Deadly serious: as they always had been from the very beginning.

"Get the girl! She's a threat to Simon!" Paisley ordered as her body instinctively lunged to grab back the pink-haired girl. Her fist flung in a useless arch away from her body and was caught by Snake's precise palm, his fingers closing over her knuckles. He briefly worried of the injury his sudden endeavor might have inflicted upon his sister, but conceded that if he didn't focus on incapacitating these psychologically unstable players, she would be subjected to a much worse fate. Biting his tongue to hold back the bitter taste hitting a girl left in his mouth, he took Paisley's wrist and contorted it upside down until he heard her wail of agony from the tearing of her ligaments. Blunting the impact by using his elbow, Snake rammed her in the gut, the blow sucking all the air out of her chest in one, breathless heave. She plunged into the bed of wildflowers. One player, down for the count.

Simon swooped to his knees to catch his companion in the crook of his arms. "Paisley!" Her head hung limp in his gentle hand and he looked up, only to be stifled by the unreadable expression on Snake's stoic face. "What the hell is going on?" he trembled down at the ground, then shaking, looked up and shouted, "Why are you guys doing this?"

Flailing her arms out to save herself from retaining a nasty bruise to the collarbone, Clover skidded through the grass, dirt and jagged pebbles lodging themselves into the soft tissue of her skin. It hurt. It hurt like fucking hell and she felt like she would rather curl up into a ball and forget how careless she had been rather than do the sane thing and make her escape. She really, _really, _wanted to. Crying, her entire body rested limp and quivering upon the cold, hard earth. _I should run, _Clover thought in the distant background chatter of her mind as she witnessed the brawl about to break out between her noble brother and Uno.

Post Snake's minute confrontation with the girl of the monotone voice, the snap of a twig prickled through his ear and he pivoted around to deflect the oncoming fist aimed for his head. Snake anticipated the swing of Uno's knee that would follow the initial upper-body assault and removed his forearm, leaping back to skid into a crouch. Uno's kick steered haywire and he lost his balance, the leg that was planted in the ground rocking forward. He slammed his airborne foot onto the dirt, landing in an awkward split with his fingernails grazing the soil, but was still stable enough to see Snake pushing the soles of his shoes deep into the earth to gain enough leverage to spring back. Uno planned to powerhouse the regal man over the head within the span of his next maneuver. Snake frowned as the clay-faced boy curled onto his haunches like a tiger.

However, before Snake clashed once again with his opponent, he noticed through the sound of a high-pitched heavy breathing, to his horror, that Clover was still here, getting to her feet.

Fear clenching the veins in his neck into a spiral, his hair rushed around his hollow cheeks and he screamed," Clover, RUN! GET OUT OF HERE!"

Her hair was so slicked with grime and soot that it was coming undone from her pigtails. She didn't respond as she finished her climb to stand upright.

Snake ordered her again as he and Uno dashed up and traded a flurry of blows.

"GO! Leave me! I'll hold them off!"

She didn't comprehend a single word he said. Silent.

Snake's face fell. He dodged another of Uno's punches and it sailed past his shoulder.

"You jerks…" Clover mumbled, her hair casting a shadow over her face.

_I should run_ Clover echoed in the vivid forefront of her mind.

"…"

_I should… but that wouldn't really be my style. _

Bangs dripping off the valley of her freckles as she bent her head to cast away the dirt buried in her hair, a fire ignited behind her , determined gaze. She turned to the ongoing fight.

Snake and Uno fought at a stalemate, and Uno, smoother than he looked, managed to nick the edge of Snake's shin with the inner sole of his shoe, leaving a sear of pain in his wake. Snake winced and clenched his teeth, face wrenching over to Clover for a split second, long enough to hear her the rustle of her clothes as she poised to charge at them.

"_You cold, heartless jerks!_" Advancing slowly at first, in the time span it took for Snake and Uno to lock their open fingers in a close-combat struggle, Clover broke into a mad dash, her body aglow with passionate fury.

"You. Stay. Away. From my. _Big._ _BROTHER!_"

Her feet tamped over the winding field in a haste of light footsteps.

"AAAGGGHHH!"

Immobile from Snake's iron grip even as he tried wrench his torso away to meet Clover's attack, Uno's bloodshot eyes ripped apart as the realization hit him that he couldn't evade the pink-haired girl.

"Oh SHI-"

Kicking off the grass with the toe of her boot, Clover hurdled through air and bent her knee back. Twisting her hips with the boosted momentum of her shoulders, she jammed the heel of her other boot into Uno's spine.

Tearing his hands away from Snake in a shredded heap of limbs, Uno let out a stifled grunt as Clover screwed the stiletto deep into the kinks of his vertebrae. He crumpled over as his spine surrendered to the unbearable pressure, crying out in repeated sobs of torture at how he felt like his spine had snapped in half. He landed face first in the dirt, motionless, though still audibly breathing in ragged wheezes.

Victorious, Clover watched Uno collapse, mixed emotions flitting across her previously unchanging expression.

It was hilarious. Uno was just got owned by a little girl in high-heeled stilettos. Who had _pink_ hair. In _pigtails. _Clover should be writhing all over the ground, bawling her eyes out in pure hysteria at how ridiculous the situation sounded out of context. It should be funny.

But it wasn't. Not even close.

They reality was that Clover, just now, had kicked a guy so hard, he couldn't even speak, let alone move to touch his spine to possibly subdue some of the pain that provoked him to weep like a child pathetically groveling on his knees.

And, she had done it out of a sudden, violent urge for _revenge_.

"All right, Uno had his fun. I'd say it's my turn now," a sultry voice said from behind her.

One minute, Clover was staring, transfixed by the feeble rise of Uno's shoulder blades, and the in the next, she was splayed across the sidewalk, her heart beating a mantra into the cement.

Recognition struck the back of Clover's mind as the last threads of consciousness slipped through her fingers. It told her that the side of her stomach was swelling into a black and blue lump of clotted blood. Angel had slammed an uppercut into her hip. Gathering the last reserves of her rapidly fading energy, she sat up on her forearms.

Snake and Angel were fighting; the blonde picked up where Uno left off. Angel was trying to maneuver around Snake to Clover, as Clover could figure out within the bleary stretch of her vision. Her brother was putting all his efforts into barricading Clover from the blonde diva. He was panting, his legs giving in to the loss of stamina, as he guarded against a flying kick to the chin.

Snake, her dear brother, who'd never lost a fight in his entire life, was clearly outclassed by Angel.

The faux model smirked as Snake slumped to rest on his knee. "_Five_ time national Judo champion in the running. Ready to give it up? I might feel generous and let your sister live if you throw in the towel right now."

"This is insanity! *pant*," Snake said as he sidestepped Angel's swinging leg, "what kind of monstrous level are you stooping yourselves to! *pant* Clover is just an innocent victim of this game, the same as all of you!" Ducking under the swing of her arm, he drove another kick at her chest with the goal of her ribcage in mind. As soon as he was sure his hit would land its target, Angel reached out and snatched his foot out of mid-air, her grip locked around his shin with unmistakable accuracy.

Angel laughed at Snake's moral protests. "Don't you think I _know_ that? All our lives are at stake too. This is a competition. It has contenders, supervisors, and rules that apply to the flow of the game," she countered logically. "In every game ever played, there's been a winner... and a loser. I'm only playing the game the way it's supposed to be played. Besides," she said, curling her fingers in Snake's ankle and twisting it like a monkey wrench around a bolt, spurring Snake to choke on his scream of pain, "should you really be lecturing me when _you're_ the one about to be on the losing end?"

Preparing to proceed with the finishing blow, Angel raised her hand. As it came down to smash through Snake's skull, the weak, fading man used his final words to convey a message to his little sister.

"Clover... leave this place. Go. Just go. Save your life for the good of mine. Even if I surrender the battle here, I'll find you, no matter how impossible the obstacles become between us."

He smiled in serene contentment when he heard the scramble of footsteps retreating from the garden.

"Please trust me on this one certainty... we'll meet again... Clover..."

With an absolute, crushing finale, Snake was bludgeoned over the head.

By the time Clover was well-hidden underneath a fire escape attached to a—far away enough to turn around and look back—the worst thing possible for her prayers of hope was playing out in grand detail on the stage of the freshwater bridge.

Angel carried Snake's body over her shoulder, with Uno and Paisley, whom had only minutes before come to their senses, tracking through the grass behind her as they tended to their injuries. Angel apparently had lost track of Clover's whereabouts after she'd dove beneath the cover of the fire-escape ladder. Snake's final words were meant to serve as more than a message; they'd also been a diversion to buy Clover time.

Nonetheless, it wasn't that image that would forever be burned into her memory.

No, what Clover would never be able to forget for as long as the days she had left to live playing Zero's game, was the desperate look of apology that Simon sent her from across the garden square before he turned his back to follow his friends.

Clover felt her bruised hip cave into her ribs.

And then, she was alone with only the soft whispers of the wind through her hair.

Hmmm… I'm not really sure if I like how I wrote this chapter (at least not Clover and Snake's arch). Editors and critics, I beg you to run rampant! Help me here! ~KlipsyKat


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Notes:** So… as college time came upon us new high school graduates, some years ago I abandoned this story, which in hindsight, was kind of sad, because I had a ton of things planned to unfold in the coming chapters. However, as the 999 fandom has recently come back to life through Tumblr and the release of VLR (which is absolutely incredible by the way XD, and is something I could never match up to writing wise), I've found new inspiration to pick this story back up. Though I may not finish if other things take priority, for now, I'll be working again to continue writing :D. Enjoy (if anybody is still interested XD) the revival, and please review! I love constructive criticism, especially now that I have to practice my writing for group based work.

In honor of Project Bluebird, please support the fan effort to get funding for Zero Escape 3! The series needs a proper conclusion!

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Beep.

…

Beep. A snicker. One red asterisk vanishes from the screen.

Cloaked by the deep, impassable cover of the night, five shadows converse together. The tallest steps forward. It tosses its head and a white grin unsheathes in the moonlight.

"You're up, Lotus."

Without a second to lose, a click of heels promenades the pavement. The figure's golden ring twists over in the passing glint of the moon. It greets the panel.

Another beep. This time solid. Final. The shadow steps back.

Four more beeps. The sound of degraded metal hisses down on itself.

Then, a confirmation. Moaning like a monster awakened from deep in its den, the door opens. A scrambled frenzy of limbs rushes at the invitation. They leap inside.

Hard metal succumbs to the weight of its own duty, and swings back to sleep once more.

The door shuts tight. A countdown can be heard descending from within the building.

On the door was a number '8'.

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Moving into the second stage of their makeshift dungeon, Junpei, June, and Santa stepped through the door to the next room. Tense and alert, they were waiting for any unexpected surprise to pop out from behind the wall, their faces stiff with developing traces of sweat and concentration.

However, the one thing they weren't prepared for wasn't exactly kind in revealing itself.

Immediately after the gentle tap of June's shoes cleared the barrier, she let go of the door. Eager to spite the companions, if a door could even spite at all, the door began to swing back in place.

As if he had a feeling something would come to poison their progress, Junpei's neck shot around just as the door plucked itself from June's fingers.

_"Shit!"_

Instinct taking over conscious action, the college student lunged at the door, but it was too late. Intangibly smirking at its own triumph, the door shut behind them, metal knob clicking into place. Junpei's hand sailed through the air and landed on the antique metal. He shook the door furiously and the hinges rattled like a suspect that refused to speak.

General reactions were predictable.

"Uh-oh… I didn't realize…" June said, hands curling up to hide her mouth.

Junpei hardly heard her. His eyes spread wide and twitched. Once he realized that they were permanently locked in, their source of food still on the other side, his hands unclasped from the knob and fell away, swinging at his sides. He leant over with his arms just hanging there, gaping. His eyes never left the knob as Santa marched past and brushed him aside.

The silver man took one look at the handle and within the span of a second, his expression cracked. He swung his leg up and slammed the sole of his boot into the redwood.

_"BITCHSHITDAMNPISSFUCKCUNTMOTHERFUCKER-ASS!"_

Winding his foot back, he kicked the door again for good measure. Then, devolving back into a stance of impatience with the world, Santa leaned on his heels, crossed his arms, and glared a hole through the wood.

"…"

"…"

"Do you _practice_ saying them like that?" Junpei said.

Santa sniffed.

"Maybe."

Scratching the side of his nose, the white-haired man looked to the ceiling for nothing in particular, and then turned around to Junpei.

"What's your problem?"

Junpei blinked, let out a sigh, and snapped his head around to face the white haired man, tilting his brow.

"None. I don't have one," he said, and paused to crack his shoulder, readjusting his arms. He breathed a slight start, but didn't say anything else, eyes a trace bleary as they glanced over Santa.

A thick silence held the room as the three stood in front of the door. It was odd, unnerving even as Santa slowly retracted his foot, averting himself from the strange air that began to emanate from Junpei. June remained huddled against herself, shuffling in little worried steps around the door and uttering apologetic noises through her hands.

The background noise of June's footsteps droned in the back of Junpei's head as a hot feeling of spite drifted through him at the sight of Santa moving to examine the room.

"Wow, this looks a lot different than the ballroom. Almost the complete opposite actually," Santa said.

June perked up from her aimless meandering. "Oh… yeah I see what you mean…" June agreed, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear as she proceeded to properly pay attention to her surroundings.

The room, as Santa described, was certainly not what they expected. Not too far from the entrance were three billiards tables, the gold corners reflecting the dim light of the electric lamps hanging from the ceiling. From left to right, the tables had the numbers '1', '2', and '3' engraved in the center of the grooves, with different colored billiard balls scattered over the green carpet surface. To the left of the tables was a long, neatly shined bar counter that encased several rows of shelves, bottles of all colors and sizes mingling among them. Five cushioned bar stools were stationed in a row in front of the counter, matching well with the crimson stained wallpaper. Far in the back, beyond the billiard tables, an unusual machine akin to a giant projector was stamped on the wall, about eight feet away from what the trio presumed was the second exit. Once again, a red and green bar of metal connected the redwood door to their puzzle chamber.

"Damn, this sorta sucks. I thought we'd found the exit already. There's another door over there!" Santa scowled at the red light.

"Hmm… yeah, but remember? We're supposed to find a key in each of the numbered doors. We haven't found anything like that yet, so it must be in here," June reasoned at Santa's dismay, tapping her chin.

"Oh… well that's true." Santa blew some air through his lips, silver eyes casually hopping around the new room. "Jesus, for all we know, there'll just be an endless stream of em', puzzles inside more puzzles…" He homed in when he saw the white glint of a bottle label.

"Aw dude! Is that booze? I'd do anything for a couple shots right now. Might help me forget a few things," Santa commented with a wry twist of his lip. Brushing his fingertips over the rim of the nearest billiard table, he exuded a small hint of recognition and strode behind the bar counter.

June lowered her arms, curious to explore and wipe away the blemish of bad luck she caused the trio, following behind Santa. Junpei stayed put at the entrance, his feet cemented to the hardwood, unable—and unwilling—to move.

Milling about to make more sense of their new trial, June pointed to the strange machine attached to the far wall and quipped something to Santa. He chuckled lightly and rustled through a couple whiskey bottles. They seemed so comfortable together, Junpei noticed. So at ease.

Without him.

A shadow hooded Junpei's eyes and he opened his mouth.

"I don't have a problem," he said. "You know, except for the fact that I'm locked in here with a dumbass who can't even keep track of a bag of bagels".

Santa whipped around and slammed his arm on the counter. "Oh, shut up! It's not like either of you guys said anything before we decided to move on! We all wanted to book it out of there anyway," Santa threw back. "Let it go, we've got more important things to do here. We'll survive without food for one more fucking hour, chill out."

June mumbled into her scarf, her eyes frightened. She hoped, nay prayed, that a fight wouldn't break out, but wasn't sure if she should say anything to Junpei, especially with the way he was obscuring his face, his back to her and Santa. To her, Jumpy seemed to be acting strange. Like he wasn't quite himself. Unable to discern Junpei's state of mind, June shuffled next to Santa and whispered in his ear, the two clustering next to the bar stools.

Junpei knew Santa was right. It really wasn't that big a deal. If they didn't completely lose all their marbles, they would probably be out of here in one, maybe two hours tops. Junpei knew it well. But…

He didn't care.

Maybe it was his last conversation with June, and the way it had brought the ugly reality of the Urban Game to the forefront of his mind. Exhaustion, not even from physical exertion but at least ten different kinds of stress pervaded his spirit, weighing him down. Time. Betrayal. Fear. Death. Death was a big one. But in truth, it was really only a single thing that bothered him.

The secrets. Of which June and Santa had plenty to hide.

And when he saw June and Santa whispering behind his back, probably feeling pity for him and his pathetic misgivings, cold, filthy questions slithered their way into his heart.

"Hah… hah-hah..."

June and Santa peeked up at Junpei. The brunette man slouched in front of the locked door, hands clenched in his pockets.

"There you guys go again. Is this like in high school, talking about me behind my back? Is your childhood friend not good enough for you Akane? Goddamn, I am so done with this..." Junpei said.

"Jumpy, what are you talking about?" June whimpered, her shoulders shivering.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Santa cocked one eyebrow. "C'mon already, we need to look through these shelves."

All of a sudden, Junpei felt his insides retch.

"What the hell is wrong with me?!" Junpei spat, ripping his arms out of his pockets. "I'll tell you what the hell is wrong with me! It's you, dammit!" Stomping one foot forward, Junpei thrust a pointer finger at Santa.

"Me?!" Santa yelped, bending backward.

"The fact that you exist! And that _apparently_, you're way too important for June to say one word about! She'll talk about someone trying to strangle her to death, but about you?! Not. A. _Fucking._ Peep."

Junpei's gaze punctured Santa in the gut, his face dangerous. June's waning cheeks stretched wide.

"S-so, does it even matter?! We're practically fighting a war here, and we only have nine days left until our intestines explode. We don't have time to worry about trivial shit like whose' friends with who on Facebook. Have you gone fucking nuts Junpei?" Santa braced his shoulders and stalked past June. He wasn't afraid to knock some sense into the college student, if that was what it took.

Junpei barked a haughty snort. "HAH! I figured that's what you'd resort to. _Bring it on_! Maybe I can get some answers out of you this way." The college student invited the white-haired man toward him, cynicism dripping from his smile.

The roaring emotions of the two men engulfed the room in a raging tidal wave, shaking the floor with every stomp of Santa's shoes. Santa ground his thumb into his nails and with his other hand, snatched the zipper of Junpei's sweatshirt, jerking him off his feet. Junpei stumbled, but remained confident as his mouth spread into sleek grin, mocking Santa straight to his face.

Junpei was done. Finished. The game and Zero had constricted more life out of him than a beating from Santa could ever achieve. He wanted to feel release, clarification, whether it was painful or not.

Santa's fist shot forward with impressive speed, grazing Junpei's ear as the college student tilted it to the side, fearless in his burning need for primal resolution. Frustration flushed the silverette's face and he growled, preparing for another swing. He gripped Junpei tighter, pulling the second punch behind his head.

However, before Santa could even see the fire of Junpei's eyes, a scream rattled the walls of the pool hall.

The cry of June's voice was like a searing hot hatchet that smashed between Junpei and Santa, severing their conflict into two bleeding halves.

"STOP IT! JUST STOP IT! _I can't take it anymore! Is this the only way for you two to solve anything?!_"

A strangled gasp rasped from June's throat is she panted, her frenzied form rooted at the feet of the two men. Then, weaving her fingers through her dress, she started to back away, her knees jerking like she might faint.

"S-stop…" June's neck shrunk into her torso, petite fingers shaking violently. She collapsed against the rim of the number '1' billiards table and slid to the ground, clutching her face.

"P-Please… stop it…"

The room held still.

Junpei's confidence plummeted deep in his chest as he witnessed June, the girl he loved, crumple to the floor, defeated. With it, Junpei's body sunk as Santa released him, instant regret flooding the silver man's bones.

"Ah…" Slumping with his arms languid against his vest, Junpei watched June alongside Santa, the two men's expressions identical manifestations of remorse.

June sobbed into her palms, her brown hair splayed over her sleeves. "This is all your fault Aoi! I-I don't know why we have to do this… to keep 'us' a secret! E-Every time… We should've told Jumpy the truth a long time ago…" June's voice filtered soft and desperate through her hands, and Santa looked down in shame, his mouth flickering into a solid line.

'Us' Junpei thought. That's what this was really about, wasn't it? That dirty word, or rather, the connotations it held. It was such a stupid thing to think about, in the grand scheme. Junpei had relied upon them in the last room, felt joy and sadness with Akane, anger and resentment, and even a hint of companionship with Santa. They were all in this together. But that notion, the idea that Akane and Santa still considered the two of them 'us', while Junpei was merely 'him' plagued him like nothing else could.

"So your real name is Aoi?" Junpei drawled the unfamiliar name along his tongue, making sure to remember it. "'Us' huh… it's really been about you guys this whole time. I'm just the outsider, aren't I…" Junpei began to sense the anger welling inside his lungs once again, but he swallowed it deep into the pit of his stomach. He couldn't lose control, not with the state June was in.

Santa—no, Aoi—the mysterious man of Akane's past, didn't utter a word. His jaw was welded shut, but it seemed like the edges were starting to peel away the longer he observed the broken form of June.

A weak signal of a truce left Junpei. "Are you gonna spit it out? Or are we going to sweep this under the rug, and forget it ever happened? Make a clean slate and play the game, like good little pawns for Zero to use up and throw away?"

Santa made no sound, but Junpei could tell that his words had cut the silverette deep, urging him past some of his doubts. Weakness. They were weak, and Zero was strong. Zero had all the power. Perhaps if they could let their walls down and cast their trust out into the open, they could gain a weapon against Zero's tyranny.

The weapon of absolute vulnerability.

Santa considered this truth, applying it and dismissing it back and forth in his mind, nearly driving himself crazy with the need to make a decision. The fog of the room condensed into drops of grease that lathered through Junpei's hair, and the university major swiped his temples, refusing to take his stare off Santa. Remnants of grime also shone on June's face as she uncovered it, rising to her feet as she gathered some semblance of stability.

June wiped her nose on her sleeve, leaning with a slight limp. "*sniff* I know that it's for our own good Aoi, and it always has been, *sniff* b-but… just this one time, I think… I think we can let it go. I believe we can trust Jumpy. I really do…"

June faced Santa and their eyes locked, June's whole body pleaded the white-haired man to surrender. Santa's mouth went dry, caged by her melancholy expression, and soon his stubborn barriers began to evaporate.

"I…"

Santa paused.

Here it comes. Junpei was ready.

"Well, the thing is…"

Junpei breathed in.

"June and I, we're…"

And exhaled.

"… _siblings_."

…

Junpei nodded. Yes, yes, Santa and June were—

The college student fumbled.

"Uh… what was that again?"

"Dammit Junpei, you heard me right! We're fucking related, same old man…" Santa halted his rant, considering something.

"…brother and sister."

Junpei rubbed his ears.

Oh.

…

_Oh._

Vision fizzling out of existence, Junpei teetered on his heels, reeling into the snickering air. An imaginary audience fabricated from the depths of his mind howled with laughter all around him. He grasped his forehead, and in a gesture of great dignity, gawked at the silverette and his childhood friend, pupils leaping left and right.

Brown and silver hair. Different faces. _Very_ different personalities. But those eyes. Those blue tinted eyes was unmistakably alike. And as they bored into his soul, Junpei's memories came crashing down onto his conscious, flashbacks swirling down the looming image of a giant drain.

"_When I was kidnapped last night, there was another person with me. Someone very close to me."_

_ "S'okay Akane. No one's gonna take you away. I've got you."_

_ "You're jealous, aren't you?" he accused, prodding the air in front of Junpei. He pointed back at his chest. "Of me. You're all bent out of shape over your precious preteen crush because I was the one who rescued her!" He smirked wryly at Junpei, but his expression was bitter and held a hint of subtle protectiveness. "Well Junpei, I can assure you that __there is_—_"_

Junpei could slap himself. No wait. He _should_ slap himself.

"Oh my god… that's it…" Junpei said, hand sliding into the slick forest of his hair.

Santa winced and shook his head. Biting her lip, June crept past her trembling brother, relief evident in her aura, but with a taint of anxiety.

Things were getting serious.

"That's it…" the brunette affirmed louder, tone cracking.

"Jumpy…"

June edged closer to the college student, reaching out. Santa gritted his teeth, muscles clenching up from some pain Junpei couldn't pinpoint, or more importantly, understand.

"Don't treat it like it's some kinda commodity! It's a more important piece of info than you realize…"

Unfinished fragments of thoughts fluttered against the walls of Junpei's head, and he felt a light heat bump against his chest. June grabbed his polo sleeve and tugged it by the cuff.

"I'm… I'm really sorry Jumpy… I know it was wrong to keep this from you. B-But we had a good reason!"

Junpei lingered in an unresponsive state until June's presence unexpectedly dawned on him. Uncomfortable, Junpei held back his restless ponderings and touched her shoulder, telling her that it was okay. _Everything is fine_, he commanded himself to think.

Choosing to meet her childhood friend's gaze head on, she opened her mouth wide to speak-

…but, for some reason, nothing came out.

Of course she couldn't say it. Tell him what this whole runaround was about. He was just… _Junpei_. Nothing more. Why had he assumed that the alias of 'childhood friend' would automatically earn him June's trust? Like he was entitled to it? He was such a fool…

And with that acknowledgement, the dam holding back Junpei's curiosity burst forth.

"Are you kidding me?! _Siblings?! _That's what this whole crisis has been about, the one thing that's been driving me insane every hour of the day?! Why keep it a secret?!" Junpei layed over June, his face contorting like a handmade mold to his true emotions. Taken aback, June jolted at his outcry, her knuckles tightening.

From a force beyond his control, Junpei felt the sticky beginnings of mucus pour into his sinuses; salty and with a harsh sting. Really, was he going to cry now? _Siblings_. They were just… _siblings_. He was almost ready to accept it and let it all out…

Instead, the magnitude of Junpei's passion flooded June up to her knees, making it difficult for her to stand. Because his childhood friend was too startled to answer, Junpei pushed her away from him with a light nudge of his palm.

"I-" he stuttered, his mouth barely working, "I can't… I just don't get it… why Akane? What is it all supposed to mean…" He covered his eyes, grimacing; he could feel his nose starting to run.

With that one small gesture, though it hurt to see Junpei distance himself from her, June understood what needed to be done. So, she made another choice that, for all she may know, would leave her regretting the day she was born.

"Jumpy… I think I'm going to tell you a story. A story about what happened these past nine years we were apart…"

Santa's head suddenly jerked up, white hair prickling to life. "Akane, you can't! You remember what happened last time don't you?! We've said too much already!" He flailed his arms, still trying, desperate for her to let it go.

Her mind was made up. June was too stubborn for her own good.

"Um… back when I was only 12 years old, when we used to know each other… you remember right?"

Junpei had enough wits to confirm at least that much. "You moved away," he said, wishing he could forget.

"Right…" June trailed off.

"…or rather… that's the only explanation you could have thought of at the time."

Junpei's brow started to rise.

"What really happened is that… Aoi and I," June continued, the weight of the room closing in on her.

"…we were kidnapped."

…

_Kidnapped_.

Abducted. Taken away. The implications were endless. Junpei could only listen further.

However, June froze before she could continue. Her body turned to glass from that one confession, and her boots rocked over the wooden floor; her lower lip hung ajar. That one admission had such influence over her, harboring the power of hundreds of deeply entrenched memories.

Before Junpei could coax her back to reality, set her upright, Santa intervened.

"O-kay, _that's it_!"

In a rush of hot air, a storm of black and white overtook the two childhood friends.

"Akane, you're not gonna do this to yourself!" Santa demanded, scratching at his hair roughly, as it would alleviate some of his inner turmoil. "If… if you really wanna tell him… even if I don't think it's the right thing to do..." he said, eyes narrowing as he looked away from her.

"…lemme do it."

Grumbling under his breath, in one rough, swift move, Santa slogged up to the bar, shoved three of the bar stools away from the counter, and slung himself onto the rightmost seat.

He stared at the ground, icy and stiff. "Sit down Junpei," he said quietly.

"Uh… Santa?" Junpei mumbled and a drop of sweat trickled down his nose.

Santa's neck snapped back. His sea-silver eyes flashed.

"I _said, sit. The fuck. Down."_

Obedient as a dog, Junpei plopped onto a stool.

Santa softened his tone. "You too Akane."

June didn't respond; it was unknown whether she agreed to Santa's compromise or not. She just did as she was told, gaping with her head held low, and sat down.

The dark bags under Santa's eyes became visible in the lamp light as he made another spot check, making sure June and Junpei were at least partially there.

"Alright then… let's get this party started."

He looked to Junpei.

"Nine years ago… back when we were kids, we were on our own. No one to take care of us, nothin'."

Momentarily roused from her stupor at where Santa was taking this, June gasped.

"Aoi!"

"Akane I'm not gonna gloss it over! If we're gonna blow our cover, we may as well spill everything. I know that back then you hid it from him, but the rest of this isn't gonna make any sense if we don't just flat out admit it!" Santa begged, attempting his best to not call the whole thing off.

Junpei cringed at how loud Santa was, and cut in. "Santa—Aoi, I mean… don't yell at her! I get it, okay?! I freakin' get it! You guys…" Junpei said, running his tongue over the roof of his mouth. The revelation shocked him more than he wanted to let on. "Your parents…" he said; Santa didn't bother to interject.

"They're dead. And they have been for a long time." June sagged in her chair, her features compressing into obscurity, but Junpei was past it. He had a mission to complete.

"I get it," Junpei said more evenly. "Now tell me about what Akane said before."

"Okay, okay man! Guess you get it… good, whatever... fine." Santa said, biting on a knee-jerk insult. "Now don't interrupt me again." The frazzled man straightened in his chair. "Nine years ago—" He said a little too quickly, "It was a long, humid night near the end of the month of June. Akane was sick in bed with a fever of 104 degrees. She'd been like that for a couple hours, and I was trying everything I could to figure out what to do. We didn't have much money… nowhere near enough to pay for medicine or insurance, but this time I had no choice. So, I took her to the hospital. It was in that hospital that we were abducted and forced to be part of somethin' called…_The_ _Nonary Project_."

"…"

"_The Nonary Project…_" Junpei repeated.

"Yes, Junpei… _The Nonary Project_." Santa confirmed, grumbling under his breath. "It was a game—or what you'd call a series of games. A game that us an' sixteen other kids—kids that were abducted the same way—were forced to play. A game that was planned to go for 10 days." With those last words, the silverette raised his open hands, all fingers erect. As any human would expect, there were ten of them. Ten…

At the pace of a nauseating crawl, the memories of Zero's broadcast began to creep back into Junpei's thoughts.

_You have 10 days. Do not disappoint me._

Junpei swallowed.

Noting Junpei's lack of a reaction—the college student stayed silent as a corpse—Santa allowed him some more information.

"For those 10 days… Akane and I had to participate in an experiment every 48 hours, each of em' under the supervision of a different person. That's five experiments, two days each total, if you can't do the math. All of the experiments were meant to test a different aspect of the mind, like the effects of physical strength and mental aptitude… for instance like our um… _humanity_. B-but the big part was the effects of putting us in danger. Real danger—the kind that could kill us if we fucked up. By putting us in danger and testing our natural abilities they wanted to find a way to 'control' the mind… something I still don't completely understand to this day." Taking a break, Santa glanced at June. Her toes were tucked behind the metal ring of the stool, her hands clasped neatly in her lap. She stared, transfixed at a hole in the floor, irises glassy. Her face was blank. Blank, but still breathing.

Santa's eyes narrowed like he wanted to reach out to her, but he pressed on.

"Now, I'm not gonna bother with the big details—we don't have the time or the energy for that…" Aoi rationalized, though his check twitched, belying his own feelings on the subject. "But… I suppose I can say that a lot of things happened during those ten days. Science experiments, number logic, situations where I could practically see the choice between life and death in the palm of my hand. One of the games, the one that seemed to be the 'premier' of them all, made Akane and I wear bracelets like these ones," he said, unsheathing his wrist. "They called it… _The Nonary Game_. The other four games, well… they were simpler, but they all went back to the same ideas as the main one. Finding our natural ability… or potential_, _you could say… that would let the experimenters learn more about controlling the mind." Santa coughed at his own vague statement, and an odd feeling of suspicion occurred to Junpei. His skin tingled and he shook it away.

"It's stuff that Akane and I never want to relive… but in the end, like some sort of miracle, we still made it out alive." His gave Junpei a firm look. "We were rescued just in time."

"After us and… mos-the rest—" Santa's form veered sharply for some reason, "—of the other kids escaped, Akane and I went back to our old lives. But unfortunately, the guys behind The Nonary Project… those son of a bitches were loaded enough to bribe the media into silence. It meant nobody would ever know what they'd done to us. But… on the other hand, _because_ nobody knew, it helped us forget. We just had to be careful. _Really_ _careful_. Careful enough to never expose ourselves again."

Semi-catatonic, Junpei sat through Santa's story, drinking in every word. He splashed the revelations over his skin like water from a lukewarm sink, feeling them absorb into his pores. Nine years ago, Santa and June had been part of something sinister. Kidnappings… experimentations… finding ways to manipulate the human mind… putting innocent children in life or death situations. _The Nonary Project_… he felt sick just imagining it. Furthermore, in the process of putting Santa's confessions together, he realized something. He didn't know anything about the Urban Game. Nothing. Nada. And it made him wonder how he'd managed to stay composed for so long. How he could even have the willpower to move after hearing that broadcast? Now that he thought about, how the hell was he still _sane_? Santa and a June, if what he was hearing was true, had prior connections to what was happening. How were _they_ still sane?

With that, he college student decided to regard June for a moment. She hadn't budged an inch throughout the whole conversation. He could see pink veins bulging under his lashes, spreading like tree branches. Her lips were chapped and she didn't bother to lick them. June looked fragile, as if she'd regressed back into being an infant.

What could she be thinking about? What could have happened back then, that was so horrifying, so unspeakable that she had to have her brother speak for her? _What?!_ Junpei was having the overwhelming urge to tackle Santa to the ground and throttle the details from him. He needed to know so he could comfort her… somehow… _anyhow_…

Santa's voice steered him to his senses.

"But… five years ago, just when Akane and I started to feel like we were living normal lives—a year after I graduated high school and Akane was sixteen—rumors started floatin' around about the game's involvement with a company called Cradle Pharmaceutical. Somehow, someone had gotten a hold of information they weren't supposed to. Basically, there was this website online created by some anonymous user, that'd been gaining some followers steadily over the years. Something we never even knew existed. And… it was on that site that a couple of the bloody secrets got spilled out in the open."

_Secrets of the Nonary Game…_

"At first it was kinda quiet… most people though the rumors were a bunch of scare propaganda, designed to make them become suspicious of Cradle, since it was a high profile medical company that contributed a lot to everyday research. But, as the years went by… it steadily gained more and more followers. Enough to become noticeable. And, like you'd think, when something becomes noticeable… that's when they take action."

_Sixteen kids…_

"Over the course of the next year, we heard about the murders of young adults, both male and female, their names the same as those kids we played the game with back on that ship. And, one day, right on cue… they came for us too. Really… it's pretty ironic. Whoever made that site, decided it was their business to tell the whole world of the horrors we faced, was just trying to help us. But instead, they did the opposite—it ruined our lives. We had nowhere to turn to. Nowhere was safe. So, we ran. Ran and ran, like the goddamn' gingerbread man." Santa smiled in pain. "And we've been running right up until now… until The Urban Game."

Santa shifted to plant his foot on the cushion of the stool, draping his elbow over his knee. He dipped his head into the crook of his arm, simply resting there. He looked past Junpei's head at the ceiling.

_This city will be a battlefield where only the strongest may prosper. The person you think you know the most may stab in the back, abandon you, or kill you if it will enhance their own chance of clawing up the ladder. I assure you, there is no other way to escape the city; you, as players, are barricaded in until you find the one manner of escape, or time is up. Permanently._

"I'm guessin' its coming back to you, right? What Zero said on the TV. It's hard to explain, but it's the same as back then. Ten days to escape. Numbered bracelets that go from 1 to 9. A grand competition where random people are pit against each other. All the pieces are too similar to be a coincidence. They're here, in the Urban Game. And that gives us—Akane and I—a reason to think those people from nine years ago…" Santa leaned towards Junpei, his features grave.

"They're here, somewhere in this city. And we could come face to face with them at any moment," he said. The fog of the room swirled around them, pulsing with volatile heat.

"That's why we decided to keep our identities a secret. Especially our names. I mean, it was bad enough that you already knew Akane's real name! What was I gonna do if you were a spy or somethin' for those bastards. It's happened before…"

At that statement, Junpei readied his tongue, but Santa held up his hand.

"I hate to say it Junpei, but we're all the victims here. Some of us are just more innocent than others. When you've had a hard life and the world's given you nothing but misery… you sometimes feel like you can't trust anybody. Not even your childhood friend. Though I will admit, as much as I think it was the right thing to do, this charade wasn't Akane's idea… it was mine." he spoke with bitterness and a very faint hint of sorrow. "But can you blame me Junpei? There's a lot of things you don't know about us. And there's a lot of things I don't know about you. But Akane trusts you and I guess cuz of destiny, or some horse shit like that, we're all together right now. We're stuck. So, before everything probably goes to hell… I'll make the best of it with you."

Santa's speech was painfully blunt, and stifled anything Junpei could have offered back. However, Junpei had some sort of sentiment that Santa's words came from a meaningful place. He wasn't just spouting nonsense. He really meant what he said.

And when Santa offered Junpei a brittle hand and Junpei reached out to shake it, there was—though almost imperceptable—a spark of trust in the silverette's listless gaze.

"I... I see. Th-thanks Santa… that clears a lot of things up," he said, and right when he said it, he felt dumb, idiotic. He was too stupid to articulate anything more.

Junpei thought back to all the times in the past he had come between the siblings. Caused them grief due to his own selfish desires. And yet, here Santa was, telling him his darkest secrets, even things about June Junpei would have never imagined could be real. Unbelievable things, the kind that only happened in horror films or documentaries about child abandonment. Laid bare, for him-a mere example of normality to the human world—to chew up and scrutinize. He wasn't sure he had the experience, or the personal importance to handle it. Junpei felt himself reaching inside and examining his past actions. And, as he viewed the slideshow of each memory pass by, the lingering guilt grew stronger.

Junpei had blamed Santa—no, Aoi—for many things. He declared him to be the loose cannon, the anomaly with a vague, yet suspicious connection to June. But he got it all wrong; Santa wasn't the wild card of the trio, waiting to detonate at a moment's notice.

It was Junpei himself.

The carefree jokes, the flirting. They were pure adrenaline extract, a drug to sate Junpei as fear strangled his very core in a tight embrace. From the beginning, the moment he awoke in that hotel room, it lurked in the shadows, waiting to lash out around Junpei's fading sanity and take control. In truth he had no right to know the things they were telling him. But, regardless, here they were, laying their guts all over the table, and it was about time that Junpei owed an apology in return.

That and the minutes kept ticking by. They had already wasted _way_ too much time.

Time. Precious time…

"Hey… you know… I'm sorry about before. It was really selfish of me to blow up like that. I was feeling… off. The game got me a bit crazy. So… is it okay to move on? This is a lot to digest all at once… particularly for me… but we've really got to get out of here as soon as possible."

All three of them had the color drained from their skin. Worn. Beaten. Hunger pangs wracked their intestines in dull throbs. They were tired. So very tired…

June sighed, her expression mostly indiscernible, and Santa and Junpei jumped at the abrupt change in her demeanor. The blood refilled her face once Santa had left the subject of the game nine years ago, like her soul had been ignited from a grim, undead sleep. "Yeah… I don't want to sound like I'm complaining, but I'm really sleepy. Plus we have to eat at least something before it gets too late."

Santa started to nod, slowly at first, but then with more assurance. "Yeah… _yeah_. Let's get the fuck out of here."

They all gave each other feeble smiles, as if to say 'Amen to that'.

Junpei was the first to inch off the stool and rise to his feet. As June adjusted her skirt to follow suit, he walked up to her, frowning, and offered to help her up.

"Hey June, are you sure you're okay enough to stand? I know it's been really rough for you… all_ this._" Junpei opted out the specifics to keep her more favorable state of health going, observing her gently. "Like I said… a lot of it was my fault, and-… just so you know, I don't judge you at all for keeping this from me. You can slap me, o-or kick me in the balls… whatever you want to do, if it will make you feel better. I pretty much deserve it. "

Santa bent his knees and hopped off the edge of the stool, making a smooth landing on the floor next to Junpei. "It's cool man, forget it. We're done, I told you everything, so _stop talkin' about it_, okay?" Exasperated, Santa flung his scarf over his shoulder and smoothed back his hairline. "No more. Let's get to work." Glaring at Junpei like he was tempted to hurl him aside and assist June himself—_extremely _tempted_—_he imparted a scoff and spun away from the pair of childhood friends.

Kneading his crinkled forehead, the silver man pivoted around the bar counter with a twist of his wrist, heading to the back shelves.

Told him _everything_ huh… somehow Junpei doubted that. There was so much more to discuss. He had about one hundred more questions to bombard Santa with, now that he contemplated over his new stockpile of information. However, that would be for later… much later. When June wasn't nearby to hear them.

For now, he would play along with Zero's game.

"Aw Jumpy… you know I couldn't bring myself to do something like that to you. It was… it was partly me too. All of us were at fault in some way. I do appreciate you worrying about me… it's very sweet of you," she said, picking at her dress. "But I'll be fine, I can take care of myself you know. I'm just glad that you and Ao—S-Santa resolved whatever was going on between you two… and that you're not mad at me for keeping everything a secret." June blushed and wiggled out a tiny smile, avoiding Jupei's somber gaze as he noticed how haggard her breathing was. She grasped Junpei's large palm with her smaller one, and he pulled her upright. For the brief minute after, the college student stroked a path with his thumb up her ring finger to her knuckle, eyes fixed on her flushed cheeks. Her hand hung in his grip, limp and paler than usual. His lips parted and a puff of hot air drifted from them. She peered up at him… and within the span of the next second, she was gone, working her way to the back near the exit door.

Feeling a chill ripple through his empty hand, he dropped it to his side and tapped over to the billiard tables.

The floorboards groaned under the activity of the three companions, the walls creaking as if they weren't attuned to the presence of living beings. A rather weird notion crossed Junpei… they had been in this room for a fair while, but since they had chosen to direct their attention amongst each other rather than look around, the atmosphere in it was still foreign to them. The machine in the back was particularly strange, but Junpei figured he would check it out in a couple minutes. Passing off this observation along the border of his thoughts, Junpei circled the billiard tables, scanning the mishmash of colored balls strewn about the green surface.

Distributed among the three billiard tables, the pool balls that were part of a typical billiards game were split into three groups of five. Numbers 1-5 were on table number '1', 6-10 were on table '2', and 11-15 occupied table number '3' in a predictable, intuitive manner. On the contrary though, the way they resembled a scattered mess—numbers all over the place with no perceivable pattern or logic in sight—was far from intuitive.

Junpei touched his chin, glancing up to see June crouched next to the exit door squinting through the keyhole, and Santa digging through chorus lines of liquor. Scrunching up his face in an extra effort to pretend that he knew what he was doing, Junpei bowed over the number '1' table; casting a shadow under the lamp light, he plucked the '3' ball from its resting place. Lifting it to eye level, he inspected the spot of the table that had been underneath.

"Hm… yes-yes, very fascinating…" Junpei hummed, slowly adopting the image of a wise detective as he rolled the number '3' ball between his fingers.

Beneath the number '3' ball, pasted to the table from the looks of it, was a small black dot. Marked on the dot was another '3'. Checking to make sure this was a consistent thing, Junpei set the ball back down and looked under the other ones. Each one of their places was marked in the same way, prompting Junpei to assume the marks were there so that they could reset the balls if they messed up… _something_. What that something was, Junpei wasn't positive; he was never much of a socializer, and had been to a pub maybe once or twice. He always thought those sort of places were for gamblers; people looking for a good time betting cold, hard cash. The kind of money which—for a poor college student like him—was hopelessly nonexistent.

"If you don't have money, you don't have balls either… no wonder they get all the chicks," Junpei muttered, quirking the corner of his lips. He was about to plunge his arm into the hole on the end of the table when a triumphant grunt sounded from behind the bar.

"Sheesh, finally found something under all this crap," Santa grumbled, dragging something flat out from behind the last of the bottles. Flipping over the object to its white side—which appeared similar to a frame—he dangled it above his head. "Looks like a white board… like the ones we used to have in school. It's got a rectangle with numbers on it." He started to trace the permanent marks branded around the edges. "1, 2, 3, 4, 5…"

A secondary bell of elation chimed from June. "O-Oh, I found something too guys! Though it doesn't look like much…" She shifted from her crouch and came to join Junpei at the billiards table, twirling something thin and black in her hand.

Junpei scrambled to put the billiard ball back in its place, squashing his arms behind his back in rapt attention. Embarrassed that he had nothing to show, he put on a neutral face as June brandished the black object up near her nose, Santa plodding over behind her.

"I found this black thing stuck in the keyhole to the exit. It's got a felt tip at the end for erasing, so I think it might be a marker." June flipped it into the crook of her fingers. "The weird part though, is that there's no pen—nothing to draw with," June said solemnly while brushing her thumb over the felt appendage. She was about to hand it off to Junpei when Santa barged in beside her and jabbed the white board at the college student.

Floundering into a mad whirlwind of limbs, Junpei clapped the board between his hands. "Agh, jeez Santa, give me a little warning next time, will you?!" he said, scowling, and righted the frame into his line of vision.

Implacable, Santa crossed his arms, strangely serious. "You were checking out the billiards tables while we were over there, right? I want you to take a look at this for me. Particularly the dots in the middle."

Junpei crinkled his brow at Santa, but still complied, and turned back to the white board. "Okay, sure…" he drawled, aligning the board with the number '1' billiards table.

When Santa had found the board near the liquor shelves, Junpei hadn't been close enough to get a decent look, but now that it was right in front of his face, he realized what Santa was referring to. Not only was there a rectangle with numbers printed around it, but the numbers were encased inside six circles, five numbered and one blank; deeper into the center rectangle were six black dots—similar, Junpei mused—to the dots he had found underneath the billiard balls. In fact, the dots matched up perfectly with the billiard balls, they just weren't marked with the corresponding numbers.

"Oh, huh… I see what you mean. These dots line up with the billiard balls, and the numbered circles on the border are marked in the same spot as the holes in the table," Junpei remarked as June and Santa peeked over his shoulders. As the words escaped his mouth though, Junpei counted pointedly in his head. One, two, three, four, five… wait a minute…

"Uh—"

"Why is there a sixth dot?" June cried, just as Junpei was about to share the same masterfulfeat of basic counting. Junpei felt her brush against his vest and a digital number six squeezed past Junpei's elbow. Faint warmth seeped into him as she poked the dot in question.

"This one right here," she said, tapping her finger on it—it was the one closest to the middle—again as if to emphasize her statement. "And there's also the blank circle on the border too. Is there supposed to be another ball, and we have to find it somewhere in this room?"

A light rash of pink trickled over Junpei's cheeks as his focus strayed to the top of her head, and he wrenched it back onto the board. "Actually… I'm not sure," he quipped awkwardly, fluffing his hair with his free hand. "That seems kinda trivial for Zero to make us do… screw around looking for another ball, when all of them have been set up so carefully." The pair of childhood friends blinked, and June retracted her arm. They didn't say anything more, contemplating.

"It's not a mistake."

Junpei looked up.

As the childhood friends mulled in silence together, Santa had snuck to the other side of billiards table, right across from Junpei. Junpei wondered how the white-haired man managed to slink around them so quietly, when Santa leaned forward and gestured to all three tables with a sweep of his wrist.

"There's only fifteen numbered billiard balls in pool, not including the white cue ball. All fifteen are on these tables right now. Zero wouldn't bother making us look for somethin' that doesn't exist." He rested his chin on his hand, clicking his tongue as he inspected the table, oblivious to the perplexed looks June and Junpei were bestowing him. "If we should be looking for anything, it would be two other white boards. Not to mention a pool cue…" he muttered to himself, unusually engrossed with scratching at the green table carpet.

Junpei gripped the frame in his hands closer to his chest. Two more boards? Why would he say tha-… oh! Duh! Junpei wriggled his lip sheepishly, feeling a bit slow.

"You mean the boards with 6 through 10 and 11 through 15? They could be anywhere," Junpei replied, surveying and taking note of the various furnishings around the room.

"We could split up again…" June suggested, but she didn't seem that interesting in looking for the boards, her attention flicking discreetly to the back wall. Potent curiosity bloomed on her features, and Junpei could guess right away what she was thinking. "…but before we do anything, I really want to know what that machine over there does."

Santa twitched and his intense focus shattered. He fixed his posture to regard his sister. "Oh you mean that thing? Heh, I almost forgot it was there for a sec…" he said, not quite making eye contact. "You wanna go take a shot at it? Junpei and I can look for the white boards while you're working on that." He slanted his eyelids towards Junpei and the college student nodded, a faint message passing through the gap between them.

"If that's okay with you guys, I think it would be a good idea. Hey Jumpy, can I have the 1 through 5 white board?" June asked, nudging Junpei's forearm.

"U-uh sure," he said, plunking it in her outstretched palm. "What are you gonna do with it? You think you'll need it for the machine?"

June plumped out her lips, determined. "I don't know for sure, but I took a quick look at it when we were searching last time, and I saw that there were these three slots built on it. So, I have a bit of a… hunch." Drawing the last word along the tip of her tongue, she tucked the board under her arm like an astute student and went on her way to the odd contraption.

Watching her go, Junpei waited until he heard the clamors of her tinkering with the machinery. By then, after Santa had given him a 'come-on-what're-you- doing' look—which he'd ignored—and given up with a shrug, heading over to the side of the room opposite the bar.

Junpei's face tightened; his stare trained on the back of June's scarf. Then, he took a delicate step in Santa's direction, the gears of his mind cranking to life as he moved to assist the search.

Continuing to watch June out of the corner of his eye, Junpei walked up to a black armchair situated in the corner of the lounge area. Santa was yanking open cabinets with a curt 'snap', then closing them with a second 'clack' the moment he glimpsed nothing inside.

The methodical snaps and clacks melded into the background rhythm of Junpei's ears as he flopped onto his knees in front of the armchair. Next to it was a glass table, with only a thin red tablecloth to adorn its surface. He didn't spy anything suspicious there, so he decided check underneath the chair.

Santa was getting closer. Junpei nearly bonked his nose on the upholstery when he spotted something light brown in the haze of brown particles. He snaked his hand into the darkness, sticking out his tongue when he felt a brush against something… furry, and scraped his nails against the outline of a frame. Snatching onto it, Junpei felt much like a scavenging raccoon as he dragged the object through the murk of dust-balls and other illegal substances.

"There we go, I gotcha you little bugger…" Junpei slid his prize out from underneath the chair. His reward, like it could be anything else, was none other than the 11 through 15 numbered white board. Rocking back onto the pads of his shoes in a crouch, he hunched over with the board in his lap, watching Santa pave his warpath through the last of the cabinets.

Santa threw the last cabinet open, paused only to see a vacuum of useless space, and glowered. "Goddammit, is there seriously nothing in _any_ of these cabinets?! Waste of my time…" he snarled, mumbling a couple more curses to add to the fire as he tossed it closed. He harrumphed and took a lazy glance at Junpei, then made a double-take.

"You've gotta be kidding me! Where the hell did you find that?!"

"Under the chair," came Junpei's succinct reply.

"That little shit…" Santa hissed through his teeth, looking away from Junpei with a hand on his hip. The steaming man shook his head and slumped onto the floor, preparing himself for a distasteful journey through the fields of the cabinet underside. Junpei left the board on the chair and slipped behind Santa, silently joining him at the next cabinet over.

Santa leaned over and planted his ear on the floor, squinting with some difficulty to see if there was anything under the cabinet. Junpei feigned some interest in doing the same, hovering over the other man as he ground his lips back and forth.

"So… Santa."

The silver man in question whacked his forearm on the cabinet leg and yelped in pain. "Owww, fuck…" he howled, and snatched the throbbing appendage to his chest. He looked up at Junpei.

"What?"

Junpei pushed his voice low in this throat. "I was just… _curious_ about something. Something you said earlier confused me."

Santa didn't move for a moment, his jaw hanging ajar, then pushed himself up. Junpei scotched closer, watching June's movements like a hawk; Santa did the same, though he attempted not to reveal it.

"Are you deaf Junpei? I thought I told you to shut up and leave it alone," he whispered harshly at Junpei like he was scolding a little boy. He suddenly shifted, eyes swimming to June, his boots, and then Junpei again. Junpei mused that maybe he wasn't the only one acting like a child.

"She-… June might hear you."

"I'll be really quiet, I promise," Junpei coaxed, wearing a self-assured smirk.

Santa rolled his eyes and grumbled, not in the sort of mood to humor the college student, but bent his ear towards him anyway.

"Tch… whatever. Just make it quick. And keep looking, or it's gonna seem suspicious." Having a dreadful feeling about what the college student was going to ask, the silverette hastily sat up and went to examine the cabinet on the far side of Junpei.

Junpei joined Santa on the cold ground and shielded the left side of his face with his hand.

"How do you know that those guys… Cradle Pharmaceutical, right? How do you know they're not Zero?"

Santa suddenly froze, like Junpei's question what he wasn't expected.

"Because you sounded really sure about it… that was all," Junpei prodded more, unnerved by how Santa's skin seemed to get even whiter.

Of course that wasn't all, _at all_. Junpei had to take this one push at a time…

Santa blinked, briefly regarding Junpei. Then, his eyelids drooped and he resumed rummaging under the cabinet. As he stretched his arm as far as he could reach, he mouthed three syllables.

Junpei thought he registered Santa's voice, but it was so timid, so subdued, that it might as well have been a trick of the heated air.

"Uh come again?"

"…ead," Santa mumbled. Nothing under that cabinet either. Santa moved on to the next one, Junpei swapping cabinets with him.

"S-sorry… it's a little hard to hear when you're down there…"

Santa stopped before lying down to inspect the next cabinet, leaving his weight on the curve of his ankles. He swallowed something hard, and spoke three solid words.

"I'd be dead."

"…"

_Oh_.

Oh _right_.

That made _perfect_ sense.

Junpei breathed in rapt attention as Santa carried on, hooking his arm under the cabinet without bothering to check with his eyes this time.

"When Cradle started targeting the kids that were in the original experiment, they didn't play games. If they caught you… caught us… A-Akane and I… you were offed. No fuckin' around. _Dead_. That was it." Wiping his hands on his pants like something sticky had leeched onto them—sweat, from the vapid air—Santa went to the next cabinet, turning to Junpei.

"If they were Zero, my dead body would be nailed to that steel wall," he said, and Junpei immediately envisioned the cold, industrial rungs of Zero's barrier. "It would be strung up like some sick, twisted celebration. A fucked up banner for everyone in this godforsaken town to laugh at…"

Junpei conjured the image in his mind, appalled that he could stomach it for more than nine seconds. Santa, strapped to the wall like a bloody puppet on display…

June…

No. _No way_. He couldn't go there. It was impossible for Junpei to even consider.

"So… that's how I know for sure. But like I said, there's still a chance that they're in this city… and could be players. The same as you and me… anybody we meet could be involved with them."

The reminder was sharp and well-defined, piercing a gaping hole in Junpei's confidence. Anyone could be an adversary. However, that wasn't important right now. For now… it was only him, June, and Santa.

And in June's case… he had to know. And at the moment, Santa was wide open.

_All of the experiments were meant to test a different aspect of the mind, like the effects of physical strength and mental aptitude… our __**humanity.**__ B-but the big part was the effects of putting us in danger_.

It was now or never.

"I see, that makes a lot more sense… you know, these people you're talking about, Cradle Pharmaceutical? The more you talk about them, to me they sound a little… unrealistically cruel. Almost like… they lack some sort of common… _humanity_."

Sucker punched. Junpei was not one for subtlety.

Santa blanched. "I-I don't know what you mean, sounds like a bunch of nonsense… you feeling a little crazy again Junpei?" Santa said hurriedly, and started searching with more rapid fervor; he practically shoved his fingers under the cabinet, attention super-glued to the floorboards.

"That's the one, isn't it? The experiment that has something to do with June. _Humanity_ huh… could you possibly indulge me on what in god's name that's supposed to mean?"

Santa chafed his knees together nervously. "W-Well 'humanity', y-you could say, was a bad word to use…. M-Maybe… 'empathy' or… _altruism_ would've been a better term…" He tacked on an off-key chuckle. "Aoi shut up, what're you doing…" He iterated under his breath, and the patter of his shuffling around got louder.

It was unusual for Santa to ever get flustered this badly, so much so that he was even tripping over his words. The hushed tone of their conversation up until now was rapidly dissipating. Junpei was getting somewhere, he could feel it.

"'Altruism' you say? That's like, the natural disposition towards helping people, right? You mean they were testing something like… what you would do when working with people in a dangerous, perhaps even… _life-threatening _situation."

"I-I don't wanna talk about it…"

Santa looked as if he was a fissure steadily splitting down the center, almost ready to breach.

"Why not? Because something happened to June?"

"Look Junpei, trust me, you don't wanna know."

The incessant clamor of Santa's mad scour for the last white board—or rather, a distraction, as it was now—finally ceased, and Santa yanked on his discovery from under the cabinet. Out popped not one, but two things. Strapped to a familiarly sized board, the telltale numbers 6 through 10 branded around its border, was a sleek, polished pool cue.

"H-Heh, look dude, we finally found it! About time, I was wondering if Zero was fuckin' around with us again… ha-ha, right?" Santa crackled out. He held his findings up at Junpei like a desperate offering.

And became petrified. The sight of Junpei's face held him captive, with no room for escape.

Junpei's head felt heavy as he pushed one last time.

"Well maybe you're right. Maybe if I knew I wouldn't want to anymore. Maybe I _shouldn't_ know. But not too long ago, I saw Akane in a state that was so fragile, it scared me near to death. And if I knew what went down, if you could stop shoving this aside like it's non-issue, I thought… that maybe I could help her."

Santa shoulders sagged and he lowered the pool cue and board, his fake enthusiasm retreating back into his body. Junpei's eyelids felt hard to support and his heart was a solid lump in his rib cage as he stared at the white-haired man.

It was quiet.

And then Santa spoke.

"Junpei… have you ever heard of the Prisoner's Dilemma?"

Junpei's mouth parted.

Both men nearly jumped off their skeletons as a thunderous crash erupted from the back wall.

"Oooo, darn it… sorry guys don't mind me," tingled the shaky voice of June.

Junpei and Santa tore their eyes away from each other like two locked rings snapping apart and zoomed over the table-tops and observe their third companion. June was bending over to pick up the 1 through 5 white board, but the two men also noticed the subtle sound of thick paper scraping along the ground.

"By the way, when you're ready I think I've got a really good idea of what we have to do! You guys should come over here," she said, straightening up and beaming at the pair of boys, a hint of satisfaction in her smile. They flashed her identical looks of mortification, the corners of their pupils ripped open with shock. As they sat there, her eyes jumped to the object in Santa's hands and she gasped.

"Oh this is perfect! You guys found the white boards! Sorry to break you two up, but could you bring those over here?" She giggled into her hand, finding Santa and Junpei amusing for some reason.

Junpei released a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding; his limbs were like logs tied to his joints. He looked to Santa and back to June's honest grin. The silver man didn't move. Something communicated in the depths of his gaze to the college student. However, he wasn't sure about exactly what it was… or _would be._

Regardless though, he had no choice in the matter now. Rising at June's request, Junpei went to retrieve the 11 through 15 board.

A minute later, all three of the trio convened together, present for attendance at the mysterious machine.

"So what's going on June? You were taking forever, Junpei and I practically told our life stories while you were gone," Santa said. Junpei grimaced at the understatement.

"Well," she announced, plopping her hand on the rusty surface. "If you gentlemen could hand me those white boards, I might feel kind enough to demonstrate."

Santa shrugged and Junpei curled his neck, but both obeyed and piled the boards on the shelf of her open arms. Junpei noted a large roll of paper squished under her sleeve, but left it for later when June called them to attention.

"Now then, watch this."

Gingerly making sure the boards were oriented in the correct position, June entered them into the three slots. Then, roaming her fingers over the colony of buttons near the projector head, she halted on one with a green arrow and clicked it.

A fan of light—brighter than normal since the room was so dim—emitted from the pyramid shaped projector, painting the screen on the wall with a white fluorescent square. Presented inside the border of light, fuzzy, but decently defined enough to read, was a black lined rectangle.

Junpei scrunched up his forehead. The black rectangle was around the same shape as the ones on the white boards and the dots were gone… but what the hell was going on outside the border? Decorated around it were spatters of black scribbles, spaced well enough, but void of any sort of coherency in design. He didn't have to contemplate long before June piped up.

"You see that it projects a border the same size as the white boards, right? This screen here-" June patted the edge of the projection space, "-I'm pretty sure is a sensor that'll activate when the right picture is projected onto it. There's two small red lights next to the buttons, which are probably lock indicators, since I couldn't come up with anything else they might be," she explained, pinching the corner of her lip with her teeth. Junpei was about to pop the question about the haphazard marks, when Santa released a growl beside him.

"What's that black stuff all over the edges? It's giving me a headache just lookin' at it."

"Santa, I thought my own brother would be sharper than that," she teased, waggling her finger.

Santa twitched at the use of such a familiar term in front of Junpei, but regained his bearings smoothly. "Wha'd'ya mean by that? It's a random mess, plain and simple. Is it supposed to make sense?"

June blew out a wisp of air. "They're not supposed to make sense, obviously, because they're just the numbers from the boards stacked on top of each other."

Processing June's comment, Junpei looked at the symbols again, and then the truth of their non-complexity dawned on him. Ah, so that meant…

"…Which tells us the purpose of this machine is to take whatever is on the three boards, and layer it into one image."

"Yeah see! Jumpy gets it."

Santa exuded a snort of indifference, folding one arm behind his head. "Ok, whatever you say. Still doesn't explain what we're supposed to draw on the boards. Not to be rude or anything, but I thought you would've been able to scrounge up more info than that with how much time we had."

"Yeah, that's it? I'm slightly underwhelmed June," Junpei said, tossing her a playful smirk.

"Silly boys, I'm not finished yet. This is just the preliminary stuff." With that, June darted over to recollect the white boards, her petite figure bustling to and fro. The two men rotated their heads with the cadence of her purposeful movements, spinning around at the same time when she whisked over to the front of the billiard tables. Junpei followed the bouncing scroll under her arm as she settled the three boards into their rightful spots.

"There we go, that should be good," the sweet girl said, swooping her hand through the air to call her companions over. Once her audience was at attention, June spread her arms wide.

"Pay attention, because this might sound a bit confusing. I know I was confused trying to figure it out in the first place." Walking across each table, she tapped the boards as she passed by. "Each of these boards, as we talked about before, has a set of dots that line up with the balls on the table. Also, you probably already noticed this, but the dots disappear when they're put through the projector. So, using this marker, _if_ we can get it fixed back to the way it was," June dipped her fingers into her striped arm warmer, and revealed the black felt marker from earlier, "-we're going to go over them."

"What we have to do, using the dots as starting points, is draw the _path _each ball has to take, from its current position," she mimicked a line being drawn between her pointer fingers with the topless marker, "-to the hole with the same number, as shown by the white boards. And that, from what I've gathered, will give us the right image when layered together."

Santa's jaw swung open dumbly for a moment, and then he whistled at June. "Few June… sounds like you've outdone yourself. Are you sure that's what we have to do?" he asked.

"That's what it looks like. With the way its set up, we won't even need the cue. We can just draw the lines from observation."

"Never mind that."

Junpei's interjection halted the progressive air, and the siblings turned to look at him oddly. "How were you able to guess that the machine layers these so-called paths—angles drawn or not—without the other two boards? Those're some pretty specific pieces of information to be stumbled upon randomly."

"Well that's," June smiled proudly at Junpei,"-a good question."

Rummaging under her arm for the rolled paper she'd been so obtuse about beforehand, June extracted the white scroll from her possession and handed it to Junpei.

"I know, because I," she sing-songed, "-have the cheat sheet. It was hiding on the floor under the projector."

Flapping the paper at Junpei, June pushed it into his open hand. Taking it as a sign that he should read what was inside, the college student unfurled the thick parchment and read the contents out loud.

"Instructions for Zero's Modified Billiards:

the rules demonstrated in the diagrams below, hit the balls in numerical order without colliding any balls together. Each numbered ball must follow a path to its corresponding numbered hole.

the path on complementary projector board, preferably using lines a clear and exact as possible.

the first two objectives have been completed, restart with the new blank slate.

…and the rest is a jumble of geometry diagrams. Just what I wanted," Junpei said, feeling his brain gag every time he attempted to distinguish one convoluted diagram from another. Mathematics were never his strongest suit.

An expression of a lady who deserved praise for her exploits crossed June's face. She gestured with her palm, expecting some sort of discourse from the two men about where they should go from there.

Instead, the room dinned around them in silence.

"Welp, that explains everything for me."

His voice a swift stab to the atmosphere, Santa approached Junpei from behind. "Gimme that," he imposed.

Junpei looked down at the paper in his hands, then back up, lifting one eyebrow. He gave Santa the paper.

"Won't be needing this," the silver man declared, and with a careless flick of his wrist, discarded the paper over his shoulder.

"W-Whoa!" Junpei heaved over to catch the fluttering paper, scooping it into his arms. "H-Hey Santa what're you doing, that's important!"

"Gotta clean the cue before we get down to business. If Zero's gonna make us play pool the wrong way, might as well do at least one thing properly." Santa dispensed an exaggerated sigh of disappointment, and went to pick up the cue where he'd left it.

"W-Wait Santa, not so fast, we're still missing the pieces to the marker! Come back here!" June pleaded.

"Easy, easy June, I got it. We'll get all our shit together, just let me do this one thing or it's gonna drive me nuts later on." Chugging along to his destination, Santa slumped over and grabbed the pool cue.

Junpei juggled the paper into a less awkward hold for his arms, craning his neck at Santa. "So… you've played this sort of stuff before? Billiards?"

"Damn straight. It's been a while though. Might be a little rusty." The white-haired man hummed a lax beat as he screwed the underside of tank top around the cue tip.

Junpei threaded his arms over his chest, a tad perturbed by Santa's nonchalant attitude. "Even if you can though, you seriously think you're good enough to pull off geometrics like this without some help?"

"Heh, slow down Junpei, you shouldn't underestimate a guy who hasn't lost a billiards bet in five years." A distinct gleam sparked in Santa's eye as he smirked up at Junpei. "I can assure you dude, I'm better with numbers than most."

Junpei met Santa's boastful claim with a snide retort of his own. "Oh, so you're a gamber, eh? Should've figured, you seemed like…" Junpei trailed off, lolling his head to the side, searching for the right inflection. "…_that_ sort of type."

"Pft, what's that supposed to mean? You should be jealous, I've made some serious dough—what the fuck?!" he spurted at the cue in his hands. Junpei lurched back at the unexpected outburst, gaping as Santa seized his shirt by the hem.

Dark splotches decorated the underside of Santa's pristine white tank. Jerking the peak of the pool cue to eye level, Santa crinkled his face at the innocently unblemished tip. "What is this thing caked in tar? I just bought this shirt!"

"That's what you get for being so hasty," Junpei snorted, though he was curious too about where the black ink had come from. Wait… black ink? Hadn't they been searching for something before that required another piece?

"Santa, could you hand me that cue for a minute? I want to checksomething."

Santa tilted his head and Junpei was vaguely reminded of June for a fleeting second. "Uh… sure, whatever man. Here," he replied, handing Junpei the stick to Junpei.

June and Santa observed Junpei curiously as he fiddled with the end of the cue. It came loose after a few tweaks and popped off; a small pointed felt tip.

"And the marker too, if you may m'lady," he requested from June.

"Here you go Jumpy," June complied.

In one fell swoop, Junpei snapped the tip and handle together. He flipped it in the air and caught it with a neat snap of his wrist.

"Ta-da! Good as new," Junpei chimed. He grinned like a dork and Santa scoffed.

"Weirdo. My poor threads…" Santa whined. He made an exaggerated show of rubbing at the stain with his spit.

"Oh, quit your bitching," Junpei said.

"Hmph, I guess it's cool. At least you solved that problem." Santa grabbed the cue back.

Junpei raised his brow. Praise? From Santa? Did he snort too many dust bunnies?

"Anyway, let's get to work. Take your battle stations," Junpei ordered in a deep authoritative tone, waving his palms around like a traffic director.

They all got down to business. June laughed and chose drawing duty. She took the marker back from Junpei. Dusting off his hands, Junpei arranges the balls on the number '1' table to make sure they were organized.

"By the way." June bumped her hand on her slim hip. "Speaking of bets, San-tawere you doing anything… _illegal_ behind my back?"

Santa snickered, leveling the pool cue betwixt his fingers as he leaned into the table. "Was nothin' but a perfect little angel June, I swear it on our weekend rounds of Old Maid at the pub," he said, snapping the next ball into the corresponding hole.

"Iunno, Santa's getting pretty kinky over here. Gotta put all them 'balls' in the proper 'holes'. Were you a gigolo in a past life? I'm impressed."

"Hey, fuck you too man," Santa said, twisting his lip as he prepped for the next shot. "I'm the one who's doing all the legwork here. I bet your only talents are making lame-ass jokes and pissing yourself when someone threatens to pound you in the face."

"Wha- bullshit dude, you had a gun that time!"

"Tch, still saved your ass and then some."

"I bet Jumpy has lots of great talents!" June blurted out, feeling a sudden need to prove Santa wrong. "I think he's really f-funny!" she sputtered, and then froze, appearing to be recalling something. "… most of the time…" she ended, wringing out her hands.

Blushing a bruise-like puce, Junpei instantly felt as if a fresh band-aid had been torn off his ego. "Well I am currently in college. That's gotta count for something… I'd hope?" he squeaked at the last second.

"Oh really? What're you studying?" Santa inquired, pretending to be less interested than he actually was.

"I'll have you know, I happen to be an English Major," Junpei harrumphed, pouting his lips.

"Oh-ho, oh man, are you one of those Shakespearean nut-jobs who spews poetry in the lounge? I used to shove guys like you in lockers," Santa snickered.

"Santa! You never even went to university." June thrust out her tongue at her brother and assaulted Junpei with a conciliatory smile. "What kind of things do you write in college Jumpy?"

Junpei had a feeling June was way too entertained for her own good. "Ah, the usual stuff. Term papers, literature reports, original works, you know, typical writing exercises. Up until now I've been doing pretty well overall, but I've still got a long way to go."

"Don't sell yourself short Jumpy, if you're doing well like you say you are, you must have some natural ability for it," June attested.

"Hm, uh thanks June…" Junpei blushed a light pink, scratching his cheek. "I'm not so sure about that, but my professors have always told me my best asset is my uh, persuasivewriting."

"I could see that…" Santa muttered into the table.

"Guess it means I've either got some charisma… or I'm just a really good liar. Not positive anymore that's a compliment or not, heh." Junpei added in a sudden need to humble himself. He looked at Santa, who was completely flat against the green cover. "By the way Santa, you skipped university? I would've thought you would want to stay in school with June."

June made a light sound and scribbled down some lines as Santa smacked the next ball into its place. Santa rolled his eyes and straightened up, giving Junpei a look that somehow insulted his intelligence without saying a word.

"Even if I did go, I would've graduated way before she could catch up. Much easier to keep track of someone when you're not neck deep in graduate projects, wouldn't you think?"

"Wait, what?"

"Dude, I'm three years older that you. Is it that hard to tell?" He teased, one corner of his mouth quirked high as he slicked back his hair with his free hand. "Must be my rugged charm. Respect your damn elders, Junpei," Santa chided, sniggering in a way that buzzed Junpei's tolerance down to boiling levels.

As the same time though, Junpei blinked, curiosity setting in. Three years? Damn… He tried to imagine himself back in elementary school. Santa would be the cool, aloof big brother picking up June at the bus stop… it wasn't that difficult to picture, but it still jibed awkwardly with Junpei's recent experiences with the guy. It was really bizarre to realize that Santa had been in high school while he and June were still cleaning bunny cages. He wrinkled his nose at the weird images parading his mind; the images eventually wafted out, only to be replaced with less savory reminders of what he should really be thinking about. Namely, Santa's piercing query, the one that had nagged the back of his mind since June had interrupted them.

_"Junpei… have you ever heard of the Prisoner's Dilemma?"_

Smashing open his bank of knowledge, Junpei dug through his brain for some sort of memoir; had he heard of such a thing before? The Prisoner's Dilemma… all he could remember was something vaguely psychology related, but otherwise, he had nothing. Once again, he would have to start all over again and pry the information out of Santa's reluctant mouth.

Over the course of the next half hour, the system of Junpei keeping track of the angle, Santa making the shot, and June sketching the trajectory proceeded along at a smooth pace. Santa made several more wisecracks at Junpei, and the two bantered back and forth relentlessly while June stifled amused smiles. She threw a couple of her own topics into the mix, and as the minutes ticked by, Junpei felt himself relax more and more into the rhythm of their task. Many times he tried to steer his mind towards the true concerns of the moment; June's past, the Nonary Game, Cradle Pharmaceutical… however, after hammered on each subject, trying as hard he could to puzzle it all together, he found it was better and much more forgiving on his psyche to leave them at the wayside.

Finally, after a good amount of time had passed, they finished off the last shot. June fixed up any lines that weren't straight on the board, distracted, while Junpei whispered to Santa.

"Jeez, are you sure you're related?" Junpei replied snidely to a comment Santa had just made about babysitting June when she was little.

"Yeah, that's right. I didn't lie. And you know what that means? As an older brother, I've had to watch you, this entire time, mack your horny ass all over my sister," Santa whispered to Junpei. Blowing a sneer through his teeth, Santa reached over and flicked Junpei on the bridge of his nose. He grinned like a white fox and Junpei flinched. Anticipating some kind of threat to follow the silver man's jibe, Junpei recoiled away from the touch.

But, strangely enough, the reprimand never came. Santa rocked backward and let out a curdled yawn. "Man, I'm beat… if it's cool with you guys, I think I'm gonna take a load off in the corner over there while you set up the projector."

"Okay that's fine, Jumpy and I can handle it," June said.

"Awesome." Carefully setting the cue on the number '2' table, the fatigued man clopped over and flung himself into the black chair on the far side or the room, exhaling a stream of air as he melted into the cool upholstery.

"Does he get some kind of sick pleasure out of insulting me?" Junpei murmured to June, a glum frown etching across his face as they strolled over to the back wall.

June stared at Junpei, her cute eyes big and unblinking; then she doubled over giggling uncontrollably into her hand.

"Wai- what's so funny?"

"Aw Jumpy, that's how you know he likes you!"

"Likes me?! Since when?" Junpei sputtered back, disconcerted by the mirthful shine of her cheeks. He whipped his head over to snag a glance at the guy in question, as if he had to make sure he and June were describing the same person.

Draped over chair, Santa was looking up at the ceiling with a dazed expression, fluttering his eyelids every so often to keep from nodding off. Was she serious?

Junpei heard a short 'click' and snapped out of his reverie, turning around to come upon June. She had gone rather quiet, her head fixed onto the image that had been recently superimposed upon the projector screen.

Apparently, she went ahead and set up the boards while Junpei was spacing out, and accounting from the beep he registered, something must have unlocked. He regarded the fizzled image on the screen, raising his brow as he recognized what it was. Compiled from the angles on the three boards, the three layers together created a single entity; the outlined structure of an open rose bloom. Junpei thoughts drifted to checking the locked door, but screeched to a halt when a faint whisper prickled his ears.

"The _Knights of the Rose_…"

"What was that?"

A spasm attacked June's shoulders. "O-Oh… n-nothing, it's nothing," she said, drooping back down.

"You said… _The Knights of the Rose. _What is that?_"_ Junpei implored softly, stepping close to her at the foot of the machine.

Winding her lips into a gnarled knot, June fiddled with her scarf. "It was the domain name… the one for that website exposing information about C-…" She hitched on that single syllable, whittling out the rest. "Cradle Pharmaceutical…"

"The picture reminded me of it…" she added, her voice a lowly mumble.

"Hm… I see." Junpei looked at the layered symbol again. A rose… composed exclusively of individual lines. _The Knights of the Rose_… interesting…

"A-Anyway… take a look at this Jumpy. I think we unlocked something."

Swishing her hair to dispel something unknown, June prodded the metal drawer built into the projector, sliding it open. Jupei poked his head over the fenced dish.

Inside were two small objects. One was a medium-sized golden key, with some sort of symbol engraved on the handle. The second was a white ball around the same girth as the billiard balls on the tables behind them. Junpei reached in and selected the key first, leaving the ball for June to take.

"Would you look what we have here. A key, _finally_. Though I don't think it's the key to the door." Junpei said with exasperation. Flipping it to the engraved side in his hand, he grazed his thumb over the circular hilt. A circle with a cross on the bottom…

"Female…" The word tasted inaccurate on his tongue. Why would the key have a female symbol on it?

"Female?" June echoed, lowering the white ball to observe the key. She curled her hand under Junpei's, pushing it up higher. "It could be…" She considered once she got a better look, "-but I think this might actually be the symbol of Venus."

"Venus? As in the greek god?"

"No, as in Venus the planet. I mean, think about it. Zero said there are nine doors and we've found this key with a symbol that could potentially be Venus. What are there also nine of?"

Junpei's eyes grew wider, realizing. "Planets. There are nine planets in our solar system."

"Right! I just have a feeling, you know?"

"Okay, so this key, if it's linked to the other planets, must be one of the keys Zero mentioned. One of the super important ones… man, we better not lose it." Junpei breathed a shaky sigh and pushed his hair back. Not wanting to consider the precautions they would have to take with that key just yet, his attention flickered to the white ball instead.

"Now what's that though?"

June looked up and met Junpei's eyes. She handed him the ball. "The cue ball for the billiards set I'd think. So this is where it went…" she mumbled. She turned back to shuffle through the little drawer and see if there was anything else.

"Wha's that, somethin' about a cue ball?" Santa slurred from the crater of his seat. He got up like it was the most laborious task ever, lifting his arms with a languid swing behind his head.

Junpei showed the ball to Santa. The white-haired man rolled his eyes. "Where the hell were you when I needed you? Makin me play pool like a fuckin' noob," he chided the inanimate object.

Junpei smirked a tiny bit and tossed Santa the ball.

"We also have one of the special keys. The "Venus Key", with that female symbol thing. June's got it right now."

"I'd hope so after all that work," Santa snorted back, though he did display a proper amount of satisfaction with their progress. He twirled the ball in circles with his thumb.

Junpei looked to June. She had gone so silent, her back hunched over the drawer.

"June?"

"_Reveal that which is out of place. Reveal truth upon the white face. All is nothing; that which is the beginning and the end. Nothing is the only truth."_

Junpei and Santa turned to the projector.

"This note". The soft brunette held up a small sheet of paper. "It was in the corner of the drawer."

"The final hint," Junpei breathed.

Santa whistled. "That's gotta be our ticket out of here."

Junpei felt his head throb. He raked his fingers through his bangs. It hurt to think. He didn't want to think anymore. He just wanted to sleep. In fact, at the moment he rather wished he would never have to think again.

"Can we sit down for a minute? I just want to rest a little before we do this…"

It was as if June could read his mind.

"Of course June." Junpei smiled softly at her. He gave her a tentative pat on her sleeve, but Santa batted the college student's hand away, wrapping one arm around his sister's shoulder and bringing her to the chair he had been in just a moment ago.

Junpei furrowed his brow, frowning, and followed, plopping cross-legged on the carpet next to the chair.

They sat there in silence contemplating the words on the note.

Reveal that which is out of place. Out of place… like some kind of secret message? Is that what they needed to open the final lock? Can't think...

"So what do you think we're gonna do once we get out of here?" Santa said, breaking the silence.

Junpei looked up at the silver man. He hadn't really thought about what they would do after they unlocked the door. Would it finally be the exit? How much time had passed since they entered the numbered door? A faint image of a pitch black city rose in Junpei's mind, empty and devoid of any inhabitants. A dead city with unknown players lurking in the shadows…

"Find a nice hot shower and sleep, that's what," Junpei responded. He suddenly felt disgusting. Hot water and food sounded like the greatest thing in the universe right now.

"We need to get shelter. Somewhere safe with a source of food nearby," June added, her voice quiet. "I want us to stay close. We all have to stick together."

_I want us to stay close._

June spoke with warm certainty. It was a desperate sort of warmth. Stay together… trust their bond… form an alliance. Could Junpei put his faith in Santa and June?

Would they be the chosen ones to escape this nightmare? What the hell was going on?

Junpei's head hurt again…

"But anyway, we need to figure this out before we can go anywhere heh heh…" June giggled weakly.

"Yeah…" Junpei mused.

"Well, first of all, I don't think we got this cue ball for nothin'," Santa tossed the ball in question into the air and snatched it back lazily. "We should be done with the numbered ones, since we had to use all of 'em to make that rose thing."

"Makes sense. But for what? That note is our only hint. _Reveal that which is out of place. Reveal that which is upon the white face._"

"Hmph, whatever the hell that means. This ball was sure "out of place" when I needed it," Santa curled his fingers sarcastically, irritated that they were going through this whole "solve the puzzle" song and dance again.

"Wait a second," June said. "Santa hold that thought."

"Huh?"

The petite girl got up and jogged over to the projector.

"What's up June?" Junpei asked.

June didn't answer and pulled the white boards from their slots. She came back over, rubbed each board with her scarf and set them down in the middle of the rug. "Jumpy, grab the instruction sheet. Santa, go get the cue."

Obedient but confused, Junpei grabbed the instructions off the rightmost billiard table while Santa went off towards the number '2' table. He unrolled it next to the boards. "You erased the boards. Are we using them for something again?"

"Well, we'll need our "white face", right?" June quipped matter-of-factly.

Junpei's face brightened. "Oooh, I see! That totally works. You're on fire today June!"

June blushed at the praise, her mouth a thin line. "Heh, thanks Jumpy, I'm just burning it up…" she joked. She didn't smile or giggle. Junpei wondered if something was wrong...

"Now…" she continued, wasting no time.

He considered asking her if she was okay, but thought better of it. She was probably just exhausted. They all were.

"Remember when we found these boards? Didn't we notice something before that was "out of place"?"

Junpei struggled to conjure up the details of the previous puzzle. A thick haze had settled inside his skull, making it a thousand times more difficult to contemplate. He didn't want to think… he only wanted to sleep…

Then, it came to him.

Junpei planted his finger on the center of the board.

"It's here. The extra dot. The one that we couldn't figure out what it was for. There's one on all the boards."

"That's right Jumpy." June managed a smile for him. "I think that this note is telling us to draw the shortest path for the cue ball on each table. Since it's the only one left, like Santa said, we have to start from the one dot that doesn't match up with the numbered balls."

"But where is the end of the path supposed to be?"

"Easy. The blank circle without a number."

"Aha, I get what you're saying."

Junpei looked to Santa for clarification that he was listening and the white-haired man nodded agreeably, his face looking about as haggard as Junpei presumed his own was. Junpei shrugged.

"Nothing to lose, may as well try, you know? June, before we forget, give the key to Santa."

"Why m-oh." Santa hummed with a bit of embarrassment and ducked his head, clutching his side pocket. He slowly pulled the revolver from it into his lap, averting his eyes from June. "Gimme it…" He mumbled.

June tilted her chin up and nodded at Santa. Her gaze narrowed at the golden weapon, her lips parted. She swallowed and presented the key.

Junpei watched as Santa moved to take the key at first, then paused. The silver man slid one large hand underneath hers, placing his other one—the one with the bracelet—over her palm. He stared June straight in the eyes.

_This will pass… It's only a precaution…_

They stayed like that, sleeves intertwined and frozen in time. Junpei felt awkward, but he couldn't find it in himself to look away. He shuddered.

Santa breathed in deep and released his sister's hand. Junpei noticed June breathing with him. The white man took the key and tucked it into his left pocket. The gun went back to the right.

"Let's do this," Santa said.

It was like a routine. With only hushed, exhausted voices between them, the trio drew the desired directions on the white boards, speaking minimally among themselves. Once the new boards were complete, June prepared them in the projector, and turned on the light once again.

Six sunken eyes watched the screen in unison.

…

"Zero."

…

An innocent beep sounded from the back wall, but none of them moved to address it.

"Bastard," Santa spat.

"Haha… very funny…" Junpei chuckled, his throat hoarse.

June said nothing.

Three sets of lines circled in a connected sequence. The three froze, hypnotized by the light. Zero…

_All is nothing; that which is the beginning and the end. Nothing is the only truth. _

_ Zero is the only truth._

_ Zero._

_Knights of the Rose._

_The Nonary Game._

…

All of a sudden, the image disappeared with a sharp bang. June had pounded the heel of her hand on the button, her face dark. Junpei flinched at

"Check the door," she said.

"Oh-okay…" Junpei said.

Junpei scuffled clumsily across the floorboards to the door. The red light was new dim and the green one had turned on.

"It's off."

He wanted to sound thrilled. Ecstatic at what they'd accomplished. They had one of the keys. They had an advantage. They might be able to win this game yet. But what was behind that door was still a mystery. Everything was…

Fuck… why didn't he know anything!? Junpei's head throbbed.

"We should be able to go know. I dunno about you, but I want out of here," Junpei said sheepishly, unnerved by the silence. No one replied.

The image of Zero drowned out all sound.

Santa and June joined him at the exit.

…

…

Santa prodded Junpei. "Open it."

Side-by-side, the siblings and their fated companion stood before the door. Junpei reached over and turned the knob with a click. He opened it.

A striped sleeve curled around his arm. The cold metal of the bracelet clamped around it burned his chest.

The three stepped into the darkness and the door swung shut.

''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''

So… just a forewarning, the Prisoner's Dilemma Santa is talking about isn't quite like

the classic one in VLR.

Gotta make a few edits on this chap, so some parts may seem a bit rushed at the end. It's a long one, so it took a while :/.


End file.
